Writing is mysterious, and it's supposed to be. . . any path that gets you there is a good path in the end. But one true thing among all these paths is the need to tap a deep vein of connection between our own uncontrollable interior preoccupations and what we're most concerned about in the world around us. We write in response to that world; we write in response to what we read and learn; and in the end we write out of our deepest selves, the live, breathing, bleeding place where the picture forms, and where it all begins.
Happiness for me is getting to write about the most important things I know.
Don't sacrifice what you want most for what you want now. Write down what you want most and see it often.
I think many writers write because it's a convenient way to explain themselves to themselves. We take the chaos and the turmoil and the bullshit of our lives, and we make it into something that has a harmonious shape and sound.
I do get a little pissed at people who write me and want me to do things, and spell my name wrong.
I love writing. I love to write, and I would eventually love to have some of my work produced.
The true writer must write not the acceptable but the true.
Black actors on the road, flying around the country working as poets. Those people are inspirations for millions of kids who write.
I just write from how I feel. As an outlet.
It's hard enough for me to write what I want to write without me trying to write what you say they want me to write which I don't want to write.
You just don't wake up one day and decide that you need to write songs.
Maybe in the back of my mind I was kind of wishing that I would become a rock star, kind of wishing that I would reach enough people who would be willing to pay me for the music, that I would actually be able to live off of just writing the songs that I wanted to write. But I don't think I really admitted to myself that that was my goal.
A book comes and says, 'Write me.
Bach is the supreme genius of music. . . This man, who knows everything and feels everything, cannot write one note, however unimportant it may appear, which is anything but transcendent. He has reached the heart of every noble thought, and has done it
I can play the guitar and the keys and the drums. I'm not brilliant at any of them. I can sing too. Some of my friends are proper musicians but I'm a song-writer. I write songs.
I think we tend to write more uplifting and vibrant music when we're in bleak and lonely surroundings. I think it's because you're channeling your loneliness in a way that you're trying to escape to your situation.
I'm quite good at multitasking, but I have to do things immediately. I have a book where I write things down: major topics, deadlines, things like that. Every few months, I start a new book.
I was so flat I used to put Xs on my chest and write: "You are here". I wore angora sweaters just so the guys would have something to pet.
When you write a book, you want to have fidelity to the character. Characters and their emotions guide the structure of the novel. The author is aware that there's a certain amount of information shehe has to provide in order to satisfy the reader, knowing that shehe has set something up that must be paid off, but this payment must be made while maintaining fidelity to the characters.
I spend my whole life trying to put up a front to prevent people from seeing certain parts of me. Weirdly, when I go to write, I feel like I have to expose it, almost compulsively.
