“When I have an idea, I turn down the flame, as if it were a little alcohol stove, as low as it will go. Then it explodes, and that is my idea.” — Ernest Hemingway

“When I have an idea, I turn down the flame, as if it were a little alcohol stove, as low as it will go. Then it explodes, and that is my idea.” — Ernest Hemingway

Paris Review interview, 2007: Interviewer: Is it possible [Hemingway] showed a generation how to get emotion into a sentence without mentioning emotion? Norman Mailer: Yes, and he did it more than anyone ever had before or after. But he’s a trap. If you’re not careful you end up writing like him. It’s very dangerous to write like Hemingway, but on the other hand it’s almost a rite of passage. I almost wouldn’t trust a young novelist – I won’t sp…