Augusten Burroughs
Augusten Burroughs
Augusten Xon Burroughsis an American writer known for his New York Times bestselling memoir Running with Scissors...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMemoirist
Date of Birth23 October 1965
CountryUnited States of America
falling-in-love love-you gun
Maybe it was a Patty Hearst thing. Stockholm syndrome or whatever it's called when you're being held against your will but then you become sucked in and fall in love. Or if not exactly love, you fall into something you can't see out of. 'I can't shoot a machine gun' becomes 'Hey, this hardly has any kick-back!
book writing long
The most important thing for a writer to do is to write. It really doesn't matter what you write as long as you are able to write fluidly, very quickly, very effortlessly. It needs to become not second nature but really first nature to you. And read; you need to read and you need to read excellent books and then some bad books. Not as many bad books, but some bad books, so that you can see what both look like and why both are what they are.
mathematical formulas
I knew that he was as reliable as a mathematical formula.
wall sadness home
I felt a bottomless sadness. So completely alone. Like one of my stuffed animals at home that I was too old for now, that sat on the shelf in my closet, mashed against the back wall.
nice space tables
Because I've lived in one room my entire life, working at the same table that you use to pay bills at and eat at. It's going to be nice to have actual space.
san-francisco worry age
I don't worry about anything in the Internet age. I have been online since I was aware of it: 1985 in San Francisco. It has changed everything in my life. I would not want to even be alive in an era that did not have it because it is essential to our evolution as a species.
trying bottles faces
My thoughts seem thick, ketchup stuck in a bottle. Like trying to feel someone's face while wearing goosedown mittens.
culture target tourism
I can't tell you how much I love Target and Costco, that kind of culture, because it's something I never felt a part of. I've always felt like a tourist because I have never fit in anywhere.
usa america today
I was on the cover of a lot of newspapers. I was on the cover of USA Today for every single day for a month. I was on the masthead, so I tend to get recognized a lot, and in weird places. It's always flattering, and it's always odd. It's always at the worst possible time.
giving-up luxury agents
As a writer, you can't allow yourself the luxury of being discouraged and giving up when you are rejected, either by agents or publishers. You absolutely must plow forward.
writing sitting lines
But I can also write in crappy motel rooms, while standing in line, or sitting in the dentist's chair.
father holiday two-sides
I've just finished my next collection, Possible Side Effects, and I'm now working on a collection of holiday stories as well as a memoir about my relationship with my father.
writing decided happens
Once I decided to write, to be published, I knew it would happen.
want being-true reader
Before I'm a writer, I'm definitely a reader and when I read memoir, I really want it to be true.