American - Novelist | April 10, 1941 -
Winter is a season of recovery and preparation.
Paul Theroux
WinterPreparationRecoverySeason
I am happy being what I am.
I AmHappyI Am HappyBeingAm
The moment that changed me for ever was the moment my first child was born. I was happy, filled with hope, and thought, 'Now I understand the whole point of work, of life, of love.'
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I like the idea of isolation, I like the idea of solitude. You can be connected and have a phone and still be lonely.
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When I went to Hong Kong, I knew at once I wanted to write a story set there.
StoryWriteHong KongKnewSetOnce
What draws me in is that a trip is a leap in the dark. It's like a metaphor for life. You set off from home, and in the classic travel book, you go to an unknown place. You discover a different world, and you discover yourself.
LifeHomeTravelYourselfMeWorld
I grew up in an era of thinking of travel as escape. The idea that you could conceivably have a new life, go somewhere, fall in love, have little children under the palm trees.
LifeLoveChildrenTravelThinking
Gain a modest reputation for being unreliable and you will never be asked to do a thing.
ReputationYouWillNeverGain
When I was in the Peace Corps I never made a phone call. I was in Central Africa; I didn't make a phone call for two years. I was in Uganda for another four years and I didn't make a phone call. So for six years I didn't make a phone call, but I wrote letters, I wrote short stories, I wrote books.
PeaceShortPhonePhone CallLetters
I was kind of raised with the suggestion that I had a duty to do; that life was real, life was earnest. And I hated that, actually. I needed to be liberated, to be told that I could live the life that I wanted to live; that I didn't need a job, or to be shouted at; that I could be myself; that I could be happy.
LifeLiveMyselfJobHappyBe Happy
Writing was in my mind from the time I was in high school, but more, the idea that I would be a doctor. I really wanted to be a medical doctor, and I had various schemes: one was to be a psychiatrist, another was tropical medicine.
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Maine out of season is unmistakably a great destination: hospitable, good-humored, plenty of elbow room, short days, dark nights of crackling ice crystals.
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