Daniel Woodrell
Daniel Woodrell
Daniel Woodrellis an American writer of fiction. He has written eight novels, most of them set in the Missouri Ozarks. Woodrell coined the phrase "country noir" to describe his 1996 novel Give Us a Kiss. Reviewers have frequently since used the term to categorize his writing...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth4 March 1953
CountryUnited States of America
best dropping join maybe school
I can't say that dropping out of school at 16 to join the Marines was my best idea. On the other hand, maybe it was. Who knows?
blew caught concerned cop decided drive ice kansas nobody ride roads
In February of 1972, a snowstorm blew into Kansas City, and I decided to hitchhike to California. The roads were icy, snowflakes howling, and nobody would drive me to the highway, so I humped through the snow and ice and caught a ride with a concerned cop to the Kansas Turnpike.
awake cup desk fully near rise wander written
I rise near dawn, make a strong cup of coffee, wander to my desk and come fully awake by reading something written the day before.
list
I had gone to enlist in the Navy, but they had a long waiting list and no need for high-school dropouts.
masters
I have always loved short stories. I have been at least as influenced by the short story masters as I have been by novelists.
confident guy knew overly
As a high-school drop-out, I knew I wanted to write, but I wasn't overly confident that I was going to be writing anything serious. I was happy enough with the idea that I could be a penny-a-word guy and survive.
full romantic
I guess it's ridiculously romantic, but I wanted to be a full tilt, sink-or-swim writer.
drawn given naturally time
I tell the story by feel most of the time, and I am not much given to labyrinthian digressions but seem to be naturally drawn to compression and pace, and the feelings come about on their own.
bit feet front history knocked naive pages taken
I was reading newspaper front pages from the 1930s, and I was taken aback. I'm not naive about American history, but I was a bit knocked off my feet by things that used to be on the front pages of newspapers.
characters criminal towards
Most of my characters aren't hillbillies anyway. Let's just call them proletariat with a disposition towards criminal activity.
Just because it's got a gun doesn't make it a crime novel, and just because there's a horse doesn't make it a western.
aware calls literary potent readily though toronto writers
I am well aware that the writers of New York, London, and Toronto are more readily noticed, though the shadowy and potent Ozarks Literary Cabal does what it can for me, then nightly joins me for dinner and calls me 'honey.'
came connection places realized taste
I came back when I'd had a taste of other places and realized that I would never feel the same sense of connection to any place other than the Ozarks.
agent collection hear short stories thinking
You want to hear an agent scream, say, 'I'm thinking about doing a collection of short stories set in the Ozarks.'