Aimee Bender Quotes

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Aimee Bender

Profession : Novelist

Birth : June 28, 1969

I noticed, when I taught elementary school, how true the squeaky wheel thing is, and how endearing squeaky wheels can be! Because when you're being a squeaky wheel, you're also really letting people know who you are.

Aimee Bender

I did plays in college, and I have half of a play. But I'm kind of stuck. I keep revisiting it so maybe it will move somewhere. There's something about plays where you can feel that sense of artifice at any moment.

Aimee Bender

I love the idea of numerology, but I don't really believe in it. But I like thinking about what numbers convey.

Aimee Bender

Novels are so much unrulier and more stressful to write. A short story can last two pages and then it's over, and that's kind of a relief. I really like balancing the two.

Aimee Bender

Some creative writing programs seem evil, but my experience at Irvine was totally the opposite, where I feel like they were really good at focusing in on each writers voice and setting. When I felt like I was obligated to write a story that was more typical, no one really liked it.

Aimee Bender

As a kid, I often figured it was good to be patient to a fault.

Aimee Bender

One thing I don't want to feel is marketplace pressure, so I'm really glad I enjoy teaching because I can rely on that for a salary. I think it would be such a different game if I had to write a book that has to sell well.

Aimee Bender

I like the idea of a place that is dealing with painful, messy, frightening, and very human events that is also so beautiful and ethereal.

Aimee Bender

There's a spectrum of those moments of connection and the moments we fail to connect, going from super-large successes to failures. Success would be love, I guess, and failure could still be love, but the bad side; and loss.

Aimee Bender

Granted, I'm someone who loves words. I've always loved poetry - so it's suited to me.

Aimee Bender

I get a little myopic in the act of doing any writing. I think I'm not as interested or not as able to write about balance, because I think there's something I want to try to get at. I'm trying to get at something about the experience of growing up or about families.

Aimee Bender

As a kid, I liked making up stories, and I wrote a story about a kangaroo and a bat with Christy Chang, and she went on to become a surgeon.

Aimee Bender