“Amina Cain’s newest book, which describes itself as a “diary of fiction,””
“A Horse at Night illustrates, with gentle accuracy, a life both inextricable from and transformed by writing and reading. Cain writes, “One reads or writes a novel like one goes out to walk in the heat, or into the rain, to buy the persimmon and the butter.””
“A diary is a kind of return, a place for dreaming.”
“Those diaries filled with space are like quiet launching pads, and they’re peaceful because they don’t hold any pressure. When I write in a diary, I’m not trying to do anything, just reflecting on some aspect of my life or writing. It puts me at ease. The entries perhaps help me to stay at ease when I move into a different writing space, like an essay or a novel. They cast their spell”
“I have a great love for sentences, for what they are capable of, and at a certain point I realized that, in some respects, I write fiction simply to dwell in the space of them, and to create imagery, too”
“Sentences hold an uncanny power. I don’t think I’ve ever thought that of plot”
“I’m amazed at how long I can work on a book without it presenting to me any real title”
“I’m a slow writer, and though I accept that, and believe that my voice and style come out of that slowness, sometimes I’m bored by it. I’m bored by bad writing, but I don’t always know how to get to what feels good without first mucking through the bad”
“I feel that one must be okay with boredom, and know that there can be value in it, that it can transport you. Sometimes one must be able to sit with something for a long while”
“I don’t want to stay stuck to what I’ve already been doing. I want to write it all”