Aleksandar Hemon quotes - page 2

The privilege of a middle-class, stable, bourgeois life is that you can pretend that you are not complicated and project yourself as a solid, uncomplicated person, with refined life goals and achievements. (Aleksandar Hemon)
I actually didn't listen to the Beatles song 'Nowhere Man' when I was writing my book of the same name. What I listened to a lot was 'Abbey Road.' Its disjointedness and its readiness to confuse only to delight were inspiring to me. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I cannot stand that whole game of confession, that is: Here I have sinned, now I'm confessing my sins, and describing my path of sin and then in the act of confession I beg for your forgiveness and redemption. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I cannot live or write without music. It stimulates the normally dormant parts of my brain that come in handy when constructing fiction. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
When I found myself in the U.S., and the war was at full swing in Bosnia, I read for survival - it was a means of thought resuscitation. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I wish I could avoid the people who have threatened me. My favorite threat is that I will be thrown in the River Miljacka, which is at most knee-deep, with my feet bound in cement. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I am just like everybody else...because there is nobody like me in the whole world. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
In Bosnian, there's no distinction in literature between fiction and nonfiction; there's no word describing that. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I long for, not a writer's retreat - I can write in any situation - but a reader's retreat. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I do have a sense of displacement as constant instability - the uninterrupted existence of everything that I love and care about is not guaranteed at all. I wait for catastrophes. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I did not intend to stay; I had no experience in the United States - I may have been here less than 24 hours - but I knew I would never get inside there. And 'there' not being America necessarily, but that harmonious mode of living that some people are lucky enough to have in this country. (Aleksandar Hemon)
I really don't feel that any of the pieces I wrote were confessions; there are no revelations about secrets in my life, and actually I have nothing to confess and I certainly do not ask for redemption and there is no reward for confessing that I expect. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
When I came to America, I was already a writer, already published in Bosnia. I was planning to go back, but I had no choice but to stay here after the civil war, so I enrolled at Northwestern in a master's program and studied American literature. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I've been a Nick Cave fan since the early '80s when he was part of The Birthday Party thing singing Australian self-destructive rock band and I've always followed his work and loved it. View quote
Aleksandar Hemon
I don't make notes for myself because I either lose them or they make no sense to me at all. I once found a piece of paper with the note: 'everything.' Apparently I made a note to myself not to forget everything! View quote
Aleksandar Hemon