Kent Haruf Quotes

• A girl is different. They want things. They need things on a regular schedule. Why, a girl's got purposes you and me can't even imagine. They got ideas in their heads you and me can't even suppose.

  Kent Haruf

  Girl, Ideas, Different

  FaceBook post by Kent Haruf from Jul 30, 2013

  47 Copy quote

• He wanted to think of words that would make some difference but there were none in any language he knew that were sufficient to the moment or that would change a single thing.

  Kent Haruf

  Thinking, Differences, Language

  FaceBook post by Kent Haruf from Dec 18, 2016

  19 Copy quote

• You have to believe in yourself despite the evidence.

  Kent Haruf

  Believe, Evidence, Despite

  "The Making Of A Writer" by Kent Haruf, granta.com. 2011.

  12 Copy quote

• I wake each day and try to see what I might do that is of some value and joy. It's a strange life. I don't know how long it'll go on. I don't look past tomorrow. Anything beyond tomorrow seems like hearsay. Or fairy tales.

  Kent Haruf

  Past, Long, Joy

  9 Copy quote

• My desire is to be anonymous, isolated, quiet, peaceful, and concentrated.

  Kent Haruf

  Peaceful, Desire, Quiet

  6 Copy quote

• It seems to me nothing man has done or built on this land is an improvement over what was here before.

  Kent Haruf

  Men, Land, Done

  8 Copy quote

• After finishing the first draft, I work for as long as it takes (for two or three weeks, most often) to rework that first draft on a computer. Usually that involves expansion: filling in and adding to, but trying not to lose the spontaneous, direct sound. I use that first draft as a touchstone to make sure everything else in that section has the same sound, the same tone and impression of spontaneity.

  Kent Haruf

  Writing, Two, Long

  7 Copy quote

• This country's crazy in terms of fame and what people think it means. They expect a writer to be something between a Hollywood starlet and the village idiot.

  Kent Haruf

  Country, Crazy, Mean

  4 Copy quote

• Fame isn't healthy for a writer.

  Kent Haruf

  Healthy, Fame

  7 Copy quote

• I began writing seriously in my mid-20s and didnt publish my first book until I was 41.

  Kent Haruf

  Book, Writing, Firsts

  7 Copy quote

• Here was this man Tom Guthrie in Holt standing at the back window in the kitchen of his house smoking cigarettes and looking out over the back lot where the sun was just coming up.

  Kent Haruf

  Men, House, Smoking

  FaceBook post by Kent Haruf from Oct 29, 2011

  4 Copy quote

• That was on a night in August. Dad Lewis died early that morning and the young girl Alice from next door got lost in the evening and then found her way home in the dark by the streetlights of town and so returned to the people who loved her. And in the fall the days turned cold and the leaves dropped off the trees and in the winter the wind blew from the mountains and out on the high plains of Holt County there were overnight storms and three-day blizzards.

  Kent Haruf

  Girl, Morning, Dad

  Kent Haruf (2013). “Benediction”, p.198, Pan Macmillan

  4 Copy quote

• Honey, Maggie Jones said. Victoria. Listen to me. You're here now. This is where you are.

  Kent Haruf

  Honey, Maggie, Where You Are

  FaceBook post by Kent Haruf from May 16, 2012

  7 Copy quote

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