“I base them on what I've noticed about the human race.”
Blogcritics interview (2007)
Context: For me, the characters are part of the story, and come out of its development. I don't base them on people, or parts of people – the Frankenstein method. I base them on what I've noticed about the human race. … I cannot tell you how stories develop. I have an initial idea, and start telling myself the story, day by day.
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Donald E. Westlake 19
American novelist 1933–2008Related quotes
Source: Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons
“It so happens that I never talk about race. I do not know what race is.”
The Guardian (6 June 1970).
1970s
“What a man notices first about a woman is whether she notices him.”
"Edward Albee : An Interview", in Edward Albee : Planned Wilderness (1980) edited by Patricia De La Fuente, p. 8
Context: I've noticed that there is not necessarily a great relationship between what the majority of critics have to say and what is actually true. Some of them are so busy trying to mold the public taste according to the limits of their perceptions, and others are so busy reflecting what they consider to be the public taste — that view limited again by their perception. You find very few critics who approach their job with a combination of information and enthusiasm and humility that makes for a good critic. But there is nothing wrong with critics as long as people don't pay any attention to them. I mean, nobody wants to put them out of a job and a good critic is not necessarily a dead critic. It's just that people take what a critic says as a fact rather than an opinion, and you have to know whether the opinion of the critic is informed or uninformed, intelligent of stupid — but most people don't take the trouble.
On his audience, quoted in Awopbopaloobop Alopbamboom: The Golden Age of Rock https://books.google.com/books?id=GDqHDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT10&lpg=PT10&dq=johnnie+ray+i%27ve+got+no+talent.+Still+sing+flat+as+a+table.+I%27m+a+sort+of+human+spaniel.+People+come+to+see+what+I%27m+like.+I+make+them+feel,+I+exhaust+them,+I+destroy+them.&source=bl&ots=TA8ZYtZoiO&sig=ghfk2d2wBgArGv8PV2AlqkXAavY&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjs7dWrpI7UAhUr1oMKHRwCDeMQ6AEIKjAB#v=onepage&q=johnnie%20ray%20i've%20got%20no%20talent.%20Still%20sing%20flat%20as%20a%20table.%20I'm%20a%20sort%20of%20human%20spaniel.%20People%20come%20to%20see%20what%20I'm%20like.%20I%20make%20them%20feel%2C%20I%20exhaust%20them%2C%20I%20destroy%20them.&f=false
Source: Time Tunnel (1964), Chapter 2 (p. 22).
