Steve Toltz Quotes

I think as you get older, there are things that there's just no light side to, but you know, I guess the more you empathise with people, the more empathy you have, the less you are able to see the lighter side.

- Steve Toltz

I actually went into writing first to supplement my income, which was a strange thing to do, and actually failed.

- Steve Toltz

Optimism isn't funny unless you are laughing at the person, whereas extreme pessimism is extremely funny. It's exaggeration.

- Steve Toltz

I don't really have an office or anything, and I like to have to move location every two hours. So I just kind of write in a park, on a bench, in the library, in a cafe, back to the library, that kind of thing.

- Steve Toltz

I haven't been part of the criminal world.

- Steve Toltz

I can't sit through dinner with somebody I don't like.

- Steve Toltz

People always say, 'Write what you know', but I've always found that to be terrible advice. It's quite limiting, what you know.

- Steve Toltz

There is something so arbitrary about prizes.

- Steve Toltz

There's only one common element that united every writer I've admired... they're all incredibly well-read.

- Steve Toltz

Raymond Chandler I love a lot, and the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard. I really love his voice.

- Steve Toltz

I made some probably very cringe-worthy short films that shall hopefully never make the light of day.

- Steve Toltz

When people come up to me and say, 'I read your book,' I'm thinking, 'How dare you! Who gave you a copy?'

- Steve Toltz

I don't have a great respect for reality or getting the 'facts' as a means of putting together a story.

- Steve Toltz

I am influenced by books which don't have their eye on the endgame, but which try to be entertaining on each and every page.

- Steve Toltz

I know you're supposed to hide your influences, but I suppose I see writing as riffing, really, about whatever you have been reading or thinking about that day or that week.

- Steve Toltz

If I've written five pages by hand, out of those five pages, one page might be worth saving. The rest is crap. I have to throw it away. It's like I need eight hours to do two hours' work.

- Steve Toltz

If I knew a story page by page before I started writing it, I just wouldn't do it. The process of discovery is really important for my own enjoyment.

- Steve Toltz

I enjoy being influenced by other writers.

- Steve Toltz