…he asked how my novel was going.
It's a mess, I said, truly awful, and I tried to think of some way to change the subject.
I can tell you what's wrong with it without seeing it, he said. You're missing Iago.
Iago?
The character that bounces all the other characters around. I wasted twenty years figuring that out. Look for Iago.
From Susan Neville, "Where's Iago?" in Charles Baxter & Peter Turchi, eds., Bringing the Devil to His Knees: The Craft of Fiction and the Writing Life (2001).
3 comments:
Concise and wise. I love it!
Another gem! I love when you post these kinds of quotes.
Why do I feel that we've only just begun to understand the contribution this man made, certainly to literature, but most strikingly, to fellow writers.
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