You May Slight Him, You May Praise Him; Either Way It doesn't Phase Him.
Sorry I haven't chcked in in a while, but (Insert Excuse of Choice Here) and so you see I couldn't possibly have gotten around to it any earlier than this. Anyway, here's hoping I get back on some sort of weekly schedule with this, as Neil has a lot to say (brilliant or otherwise). This weeks post: Awards, Criticisms, Reviews in general and how Neil deals.
"You'll never convince someone they liked a book they didn't. The best you can hope for is that one day a reader will go back to it and find that she or he is no longer the same person who read the book and didn't like it."
-- Neil Gaiman 03/09/02
"And, if the books are published, then you can pretty much guarantee that bad reviews will be as well. And you'll need to learn how to shrug and keep going. Or you stop, and get a real job."
– Neil Gaiman 02/03/04
“Somebody with good taste's favourite story is certain to be the one story someone else with taste just as good but different is certain I should never have allowed to see print.”
– Neil Gaiman 01/28/02
“Overall, I try not to take the praise too seriously. I like making up stories, I'm lucky that people want to read the stories I make up. If they didn't want to read them, I wouldn't be able to do anything about it, after all.
The stories wouldn't change...”
– Neil Gaiman 01/28/02
“I've written enough words that I sound more or less like me when I write, and, mostly, I trust the story. I'm pleased when people enjoyed stories I wrote, but don't mistake it for praise of me, or for any kind of objective standard of excellence. (A writer is not the work. An artist is not the art.”
– Neil Gaiman 01/28/02
"I have no idea what kind of book this is. Or rather, there's nothing quite like it out there that I can point to. Sooner or later some reviewer will say something silly but quotable like "If JRR Tolkein had written The Bonfire of the Vanities..." and it'll go on the paperback cover and thus put off everyone who might have enjoyed it."
– Neil Gaiman 02/09/01
“Then I'll be at the Hugo Ceremonies. And I'll be wandering about afterwards, either clutching a Hugo with a bemused expression on my face, and hoping they'll still let me into the Hugo Losers Party, or nibbling crisps happily in the Hugo Losers Party.”
– Neil Gaiman 08/26/03
"The Hugo, incidentally, is not the kind of award that makes meaningful phonecalls of the "We just thought you should know that you REALLY OUGHT TO COME TO CLEVELAND FOR THE AWARDS CEREMONY. We can say no more than that," variety. Or the "You've won, you won't be there, please write a speech so it's not embarassing," kind of award. In the case of the Hugos, nobody knows who's won, except the awards administrator and whoever's getting the plaques made."
– Neil Gaiman 08/28/03
“Several years ago I had an extremely miserable day when I went to link to the website of a major award, the morning before the awards ceremony, only to discover that someone had got confused and posted the winners -- and I'd won Best Novel. I alerted the organisers and they took it down, and then I went through the day -- and in particular the evening awards ceremony -- feeling like a heel, because I knew I'd won, and had to pretend that I didn't. No fun.” – Neil Gaiman 10/15/05
“Somewhere in there I learned that awards and praise don't make it easier the next time it's just you and a blank screen -- sometimes they make it harder.” – Neil Gaiman 01/27/02
"You'll never convince someone they liked a book they didn't. The best you can hope for is that one day a reader will go back to it and find that she or he is no longer the same person who read the book and didn't like it."
-- Neil Gaiman 03/09/02
"And, if the books are published, then you can pretty much guarantee that bad reviews will be as well. And you'll need to learn how to shrug and keep going. Or you stop, and get a real job."
– Neil Gaiman 02/03/04
“Somebody with good taste's favourite story is certain to be the one story someone else with taste just as good but different is certain I should never have allowed to see print.”
– Neil Gaiman 01/28/02
“Overall, I try not to take the praise too seriously. I like making up stories, I'm lucky that people want to read the stories I make up. If they didn't want to read them, I wouldn't be able to do anything about it, after all.
The stories wouldn't change...”
– Neil Gaiman 01/28/02
“I've written enough words that I sound more or less like me when I write, and, mostly, I trust the story. I'm pleased when people enjoyed stories I wrote, but don't mistake it for praise of me, or for any kind of objective standard of excellence. (A writer is not the work. An artist is not the art.”
– Neil Gaiman 01/28/02
"I have no idea what kind of book this is. Or rather, there's nothing quite like it out there that I can point to. Sooner or later some reviewer will say something silly but quotable like "If JRR Tolkein had written The Bonfire of the Vanities..." and it'll go on the paperback cover and thus put off everyone who might have enjoyed it."
– Neil Gaiman 02/09/01
“Then I'll be at the Hugo Ceremonies. And I'll be wandering about afterwards, either clutching a Hugo with a bemused expression on my face, and hoping they'll still let me into the Hugo Losers Party, or nibbling crisps happily in the Hugo Losers Party.”
– Neil Gaiman 08/26/03
"The Hugo, incidentally, is not the kind of award that makes meaningful phonecalls of the "We just thought you should know that you REALLY OUGHT TO COME TO CLEVELAND FOR THE AWARDS CEREMONY. We can say no more than that," variety. Or the "You've won, you won't be there, please write a speech so it's not embarassing," kind of award. In the case of the Hugos, nobody knows who's won, except the awards administrator and whoever's getting the plaques made."
– Neil Gaiman 08/28/03
“Several years ago I had an extremely miserable day when I went to link to the website of a major award, the morning before the awards ceremony, only to discover that someone had got confused and posted the winners -- and I'd won Best Novel. I alerted the organisers and they took it down, and then I went through the day -- and in particular the evening awards ceremony -- feeling like a heel, because I knew I'd won, and had to pretend that I didn't. No fun.” – Neil Gaiman 10/15/05
“Somewhere in there I learned that awards and praise don't make it easier the next time it's just you and a blank screen -- sometimes they make it harder.” – Neil Gaiman 01/27/02
posted by Really_Rather_Not_Nice at 7:07 AM
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