I don't understand this quote?

Question

The good parts of a book may be only something a writer is lucky enough to overhear or it may be the wreck of his whole damn life -- and one is as good as the other."

Ernest Hemimgway

Help Please...

Answer 1

Good literature can be borrowed from another man's life or be taken from the writer's own life. They are both the same. A lot of writers say you have to experience something before you can right about it. Hemingway disagrees.

Answer 2

Writing a books is a risky venture. As a writer, pay attention to the world around you. However, you will either get lucky or fail. Either way, you have learned something.

If this is a question for school, DO NOT copy this because its plagiarism. It was Ernest's way of saying writing is an experience - you can learn from your successes or failures.

If you want my two cents about it it's a bunch of crap to make things more complex than they should be. I hate a lot of modern literature, and favor Greek Drama more. Shakespeare and Edgar Allen Poe are crap to me.

On the other hand, you may love them, and if you do, ignore what I said about them.

Answer 3

The good parts of a book may be very personal and loaded with depth for the author or they may be ideas that developed from a chance event or experience w/ a phenomenon of one type or another. To good'ol Ernest it didn't really matter where the great stuff came from, only how it was woven into the tapestry of the story.

Answer 4

It suggests that,
Other's stories are as good as your own.
Some of Ernest Hemingway's stories were very much his, such as Old Man of the Sea.
Others, such as Hills like White Elephants (Which is written as sort of an "overheard" conversation of a couple on a train, discussing a baby they may not want, without actually saying what they were talking about). Definitely relates to the first part of the quote.

Some writers can get into their characters heads. Others have to get the characters out of their own head.

How's that?

Answer 5

I think that what it's saying is that the good parts that most people like is different from what a writer thinks is good as in(overhearing) or that it's affecting his whole life but either way both are equal. That's what I interpreted out of it.

Answer 6

It may be something major in his life that inspired his book, or it could be just some fleeting moment in his life. If he is a good writer, he can make a best-seller out of either.

Answer 7

this quote is only an opinion, and not a factual statement. hes saying the writer made have overheard something interesting and wrote about it. or it may have been something interesting the person went through and wrote about it. but in the end hes saying how he enjoys both either way.

Answer 8

It means the most interesting things in life worth reading or writing about come from the everyday life of people. Some of the most influential people in literature often write based on experience or on the experiences of the people around them. There is a cliche "life is stranger than fiction"

Answer 9

everyone is pretty close but forgetting one part. he's implying that people like tragedy and that is what makes alot of books good. if the writer is lucky he'll write about the tragedy of somebody the author doesn't know; not his own personal misfortunes. reread the quote one more time and i think you'll see what i mean.

Answer 10

Interesting quote that I, myself can't quite get. I think it's saying something about how the good parts of a book aren't really, originally from that author. They get the idea from somewhere else and change it up a bit. ... Something like that.