I rely heavily on rhythm when I write. You should tap your foot when you read it, all the way through. Per Petterson Read Quote
1989 was such a very, very important year in Europe. The wall fell, the Soviet Union was crumbling, and so many things happened – in 15 minutes, the world changed. Per Petterson Read Quote
When you are a sentence-based writer, they have to be good. They have to be really on the spot. Because when you don’t have a plot, really, what shall you rely on? Just language. And sometimes I am so afraid of writing the wrong thing, I just sit and wait for the right thing to come. Per Petterson Read Quote
In the Wake’ was a very bleak book. This relationship was not too good, the father and son. This time around, I wanted a father and a son who really loved each other, which would be visible on the first page and would still be there on the last page. Per Petterson Read Quote
When my mother talked about her brother, there was this light in her eyes. I thought, ‘This is the basis of a novel.’ Per Petterson Read Quote
If you’re a Norwegian writer, you are not visible in the world. The door of the English language is very hard to open for a Norwegian writer. Per Petterson Read Quote
I’m a family-based person, even though we didn’t exactly have a very happy family. I was never in any doubt that this was a centre of writing. Per Petterson Read Quote
At first I wanted to go to university, but I really didn’t dare to. I was too self-conscious, being a working-class kid. It was really difficult. I was going to study history, but the professor asked me some questions I didn’t understand, and I didn’t dare to ask what they meant. I left university and went to work in the Post. Per Petterson Read Quote
