Neil Gaiman
Neil Gaiman
Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, graphic novels, audio theatre, and films. His notable works include the comic book series The Sandman and novels Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, and The Graveyard Book. He has won numerous awards, including the Hugo, Nebula, and Bram Stoker awards, as well as the Newbery and Carnegie medals. He is the first author to win both the Newbery and the Carnegie medals for the same work, The...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth10 November 1960
CityPortchester, England
The biggest difference between England and America is that England has history, while America has geography.
American Gods is about 200,000 words long, and I'm sure there are words that are simply in there 'cause I like them. I know I couldn't justify each and every one of them.
I am remarkably likeable. Few people have ever been as likeable as I am. There is, frankly, no end to my likeability. People gather together in public assemblies to discuss how much they like me. I have several awards, and a small medal from a small country in South America which pays tribute both to how much I am liked and my general all around wonderfulness. I don't have it on me, of course. I keep my medals in my sock drawer.
America was, to them, the place that good people went to when they died. They were prepared to believe just about anything could happen in America.
I can believe things that are true and things that aren't true and I can believe things where nobody knows if they're true or not.
Call no man happy, said Shadow, until he is dead
Chicago happened slowly, like a migraine.
Gods die. And when they truly die they are unmourned and unremembered. Ideas are more difficult to kill than people, but they can be killed, in the end.
Every hour wounds. The last one kills.
My guiltiest pleasure is Harry Stephen Keeler. He may have been the greatest bad writer America has ever produced. Or perhaps the worst great writer. I do not know. There are few faults you can accuse him of that he is not guilty of. But I love him.
A life that is, like any other, unlike any other.
China was the most optimistic place I'd ever been. Everybody I met was pretty much convinced that their children would have it better than their parents had had it. It was like being in America in the 1950's, with this deep optimism about the future because everything was getting better, and that fascinated me.
There's none so blind as those who will not listen.
When I started doing Sandman, I could look at a group of people lined up to get my autograph, and I knew who was my fan and who was somebody's mum there to get a signature. It doesn't work that way anymore. They're people. They're us. That's what they look like.