All historical writing, even the most honest, is unconsciously subjective, since every age is bound, in spite of itself, to make the dead perform whatever tricks it finds necessary for its own peace of mind.
It’s more believable that a cop would get involved in solving these murders. I mean, you’re talking about writing a series. How believable is it that this Hollywood gossip columnist is going to keep stumbling on all these murders?
An as-yet-unpublished poet in Boulder, Colorado, once said to me that anything worth doing was worth doing badly. I may seem, in the foregoing sketchy pages, to have followed her advice rather too well.
The idea that any art is achieved 'intuitively' is a dehumanization of the brains, effort, and the traditions of the artist, and a classification of said artist as subhuman. It is those supposed incapable of intelligence, training, or connection with...
The rest of the morning would consist of checking on a pothole in the parking lot of the village clinic and writing up a schedule for the community centre that might finally settle the ongoing feud between the local quilting group and the bridge club...
That, incidentally, gives me the greatest possible pleasure—the knowledge that we are all linked by our friendship with a group of fictional people. What a pleasant club of which to be a member! [from the preface; on writing for people around the w...
If I could just write it down in a piece of paper, then maybe she could get a decent night's sleep, eat a little of her dinner. Maybe she could have a minute's worth of peace.
Just as writing can become calligraphy when it’s creatively, skillfully, and consciously performed, so can all other activities become art. In this case, we are reflecting upon life itself as an artistic statement—the art of living.
I decided that in order to become a big famous rock star, I would need to write my very own songs instead of wasting my time learning other peoples music too much. It may act as an obstruction in developing your very own personal style.
Yet how hard most people work for mere dust and ashes and care, taking no thought of growing in knowledge and grace, never having time to get in sight of their own ignorance.
There is nothing sacred about literature, it is damned from one end to the other. There is nothing in literature but change and change is mockery. I'll write whatever I damn please, whenever I damn please and as I damn please and it'll be good if the...
It starts off like climbing a tree or solving a puzzle - poetry, if nothing else, is just fun to write. But deeper into each and every piece, you no longer hesitate to call it work. It's passion. A poet's sense of lyrical accomplishment is then his f...
Achieving the state of SABLE is not, as many people who live with these knitters believe, a reason to stop buying yarn, but for the knitter it is an indication to write a will, bequeathing the stash to an appropriate heir.
Don’t say that poetry, my friend, is beautiful or powerful for there is no powerful or beautiful poetry There is poetry that strikes you, secretly with the diseases of writing and schizophrenia, and you rave and your self leaves you for another
She wanted me to remember that pleasure is political--for the capacity to relax and play renews the spirit and makes it possible for us to come to the work of writing clearer, ready for the journey. (bell hooks about Toni Cade Bambara)
Seth embraced her tightly. “Don’t write your future so grim. You will not die, Chloe. I will not let you die here in Alexander’s mad kingdom.” He moved her back, reaching down with one hand to gently wipe away her tears.
The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin...
Most likely, they were writing the same type of macho bullshit that I wrote, trying to sound tough with their words in case words were all that made it home.
If you write literary fiction that’s set partly in the future, you’re apparently a sci-fi writer ... I think of it as being more of a story about what remains after we lose everything and the importance of art in our lives.
I read somewhere that a man should tell the story of his life at the age of forty, and this deadline is fast approaching as I write these lines, only a few short weeks remain before this ominous birthday arrives.
In our country we call this type of mother love teng ai. My son has told me that in men's writing it is composed of two characters. The first means pain; the second means love. That is a mother's love.
