Canadian writer, lifelong student of literature and host of the YouTube channel Grant Loves Books, which offers in-depth analyses of great 19th- and 20th-century novels. At 26 he left Canada, travelled from Lisbon to Budapest and lived there 16 years before returning; he is now finishing a university degree and taking creative writing classes.
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- Four hours defending RoboCop
Grant's friend Zoltán, a bartender at an arty cinema-pub in Budapest, spent an entire evening off arguing for four hours with another man that RoboCop is the best film ever made, which…
- From Lisbon to Budapest at 26
At 26 Grant left Canada and travelled by car and train from Lisbon, which he expected to be his home, all the way to Budapest, where he stayed. He returned at 42 and plans two…
- On the Road sent him to Toronto
At 19, at university in Ottawa, On the Road filled Grant with such a wild spirit that he jumped on a bus to Toronto to look up an old high-school acquaintance, which he now finds…
- Eight years of aikido in Budapest
Grant trained aikido for eight years in Budapest, plus other arts. Even a forward roll is clumsy at 24; a basic boxing jab turns out complicated. Seeing beginners after a year, and advanced…
- Kingsley Amis couldn't read his son
Kingsley Amis refused to read Martin Amis's books. Many said he was jealous of his son's sales, but Kingsley said reading Martin felt like having him in the room ringing a bell and kicking…
- Seeing Vonnegut speak in Toronto
In the 1990s Grant saw Kurt Vonnegut speak in Toronto: animated and full of warmth. Vonnegut said when his wife and daughter took up meditation he replied that he reads, which is his…
- The fishing interlude grew on him
When young, Grant was bothered by the slow trout-fishing section between the Paris carousing and the Pamplona bull-running in The Sun Also Rises. Years later it is his favourite part…
- Your father's age in the classroom
Grant feels it's unfair to be at university at his age, reading Dracula and Absalom, Absalom! with 20-year-olds. Teachers like having him there, which makes it worse, so he sits at the back…
- 'Anything with a dragon is stupid'
Grant told an English student named Attila, who called Game of Thrones the best television ever made, that anything with a dragon is stupid. The student was insulted; Grant asked what kind…
- 'Man, you complain a lot'
When Grant came back from Hungary, a colleague at his first job told him everything he said was negative. Hungarians had told him 100% of the time that they were Europe's most pessimistic…
- A British book for a British reader
Grant's Patreon lottery winner was an Englishwoman, so he sent her Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont, a forgotten British novel she'd never heard of. Her whole book club decided to read it…
- A hundred copies of his collection
Grant planned his story collection as a paid Patreon reward but printed 100 copies, far too many, so he mails one to anyone who joins his Patreon.
- Bureaucracy in British Columbia
In BC the drinking age is 19, yet signs demand ID if you look under 35, nearly twice the legal age. Grant uses this to explain why it's hard to love Canada with all its bureaucracy.
- Internet cafe twice a week in Budapest
In 16 years in Budapest Grant never had home internet; he checked email at a cafe for an hour twice a week. Back in Canada he binged YouTube book reviews, thought 'I can do that', and only…
- Mishima dismissed Dazai
Tamir describes Dazai and Mishima as UFC-like rivals; Grant recalls reading that Mishima was dismissive of Dazai as a person, saying there was nothing to get from him. Both admit they may…
- Too honest in creative writing class
In university workshops where everyone must start with what they liked, Grant has clashed with teachers and students by calling work weak, cliché-ridden, 'awful' or 'immature', words…
- Yann Martel on carrying the reader
Grant recalls Yann Martel explaining that in Life of Pi he wanted to coax readers along: are you willing to come this far? Good, now how about further?
- Film scripts in a Word document
Grant's film scripts were his most purely imaginative work. He entered them in a screenwriting competition, accepted all the feedback when they didn't win, and they now sit in a Word…
- The contrarian lawyer visitor
A Hungarian lawyer friend visiting Canada contradicted everything Grant said, even about teaching English as a second language, his own field. It made him angry until he recognized the…
Words spoken
It's hard to build a philosophy on hitchhiking. The book hasn't changed, I've changed. It's still a good book, it's just not a good book for me anymore.
Kingsley Amis said: I can't read his books, because it feels like he's in the room ringing a bell, kicking over the furniture.
- The best authors are invisible
Great prose doesn't tap your shoulder to show off; with a light touch, meaning lurks beneath the sentences rather than on the page.
- Being terrible is the price of entry
In any discipline the beginner must accept being bad; after a year of practice you see beginners and realize how far you've come.
Maybe that's it: it's not a battle between good and evil, it's a battle between creativity and laziness.
That's what I value most highly these days: this very subtle style of writing where the colors are very faint. They still paint a picture; they're not these bright, loud, fluorescent colors.
- Futile aspiration beats no desire
A protagonist who still wants something, however absurd, is more compelling than one who has given up wanting anything.
- Go to an open mic
To get over perfectionism, go to amateur poetry readings or sign up for an open mic, read whatever you can, and listen to others who try and are proud of their efforts.
- Laugh at your pain
Rather than squeezing pain for all it's worth, look at it and try to laugh at it, to rise above it.
That Japanese light touch: you need to look carefully, and you start to see something. It's not on the page, but it's there. It's lurking beneath the sentences.
Once you open up these possibilities, then anything's possible, and any kind of silly contrivance to help you figure out your ending is possible. I think that's cheating.
- Pain is a starting point, not a muse
Dwelling on pain until it becomes an obsession leads to Dazai's dead end. Pain is fuel for becoming something, and humor lets you stand above it.
- Real fears make real drama
Drama needs stakes the reader actually fears, such as nuclear war, trafficking or environmental collapse; dragons produce no tension. Science fiction should scare you with a plausible…
- Revisit the books of your youth
Go back to books you loved or disliked when young, to see how you've changed and catch what you missed.
- Slowness makes excitement exciting
Reflective, slow passages pause the action so the exciting parts feel more exciting, something the young reader who wants speed often misses.
- Take a beginner's class
Join a martial arts or other class where you have no skills, to learn humility and see incremental progress.
I consider him the Stephen King of Japanese literature.
- Unanimous agreement is suspicious
A culture where everyone piles on agreement hides honest disapproval; growth as an artist requires welcoming criticism, even when it hurts the ego.
He said, well, I read. I sit, I breathe deeply, I focus very intensely on these words that I'm reading, I feel calm, and when I'm finished reading I feel happy.
When you go to see a film it just goes stampeding across your imagination. You don't need your imagination when you see a film; it's all there.
- Creating is joy; the rest drains it
For Grant the joy is in writing; editing, formatting and submitting tap out the initial fire, so the temptation is always to start something new.
- Creation is close to spiritual
Like a child proudly bringing home a finger painting, making something through time, effort, concentration and persistence brings a pride that is almost spiritual.
- Distance clarifies your homeland
Living abroad for years makes a country's faults clearer. Like Joyce with Ireland, Grant wants to write about Canada from that vantage.
- Every fanaticism is the same mistake
Obsession with money, religion, sex, drugs or self-destruction all share one flaw: the eye is too close to one thing to see the other possibilities.
- Finish the first draft ruthlessly
Be ruthless with yourself and allow no excuses to give up until the first draft is done. You won't win the marathon, but you can finish it.
There's no dragon, man. I'm not afraid. I'm afraid of nuclear war, I'm afraid of international terrorism. The environment scares the hell out of me. Dragons do nothing.
That was a nice thing to learn from the martial arts: it's okay to be terrible, because you don't have any experience.
- Match the challenge to your level
A crossword made for a five-year-old gives no satisfaction. Literature, like exercise, has to be pitched at your current comprehension and the effort you're willing to give.
I think pain is not the end. I think pain is more like the beginning. There is pain, and there is what you do with it.
- Reading makes you do the film's work
Reading forces the imagination to do the work a film does for you: turning letters into words into sentences, remembering it all, and working out why characters behave as they do.
There's something timeless about those emotions, because those emotions are perennial. It's not the sadness of 2024; that sadness existed in 1924 and 1824.
- Technique divides literature from genre
1984, Brave New World and Fahrenheit 451 are science fiction shelved as literature only because of their authors' skill; most literary novels are really romances.
- Unlimited magic is cheating
Once a story allows anything to happen, any contrivance can rescue the ending, and dramatic tension disappears.
- Write a thousand words a day
If you have a concrete idea for a novel, write every day. A thousand words is manageable; the first days are rusty, but after a week or ten days it grows to 1,500 and you'll reach the end.
If you really have a concrete idea for a novel, write it. Don't talk about it, don't dwell on it, just write it, every day. If it's a thousand words a day, do that.
You're not going to win the marathon, but you can finish the marathon, and that's good enough. That's better than most people.
When you've got to tell everybody about this book, that is a weird kind of joy to have, because it's almost like it's bigger than you.
Those long books are very rewarding, because it's like a friend you've had for so many weeks, and every time you turn a page your friend shows you a new aspect of his personality.
- Aim a short story in one direction
Workshop advice Grant accepted: in a short story every passage must move forward in one direction; cut what doesn't.
- Let a draft rest a month
After writing something, leave it for a month before editing so you see it with fresh eyes.