Marguerite Duras: Wipe things out
When it’s in a book I don’t think it’ll hurt any more …exist any more. One of the things writing does is wipe things out. Replace them. ― Marguerite Duras, …
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Mark Haddon: Writing is like being gay
I don’t remember deciding to become a writer. You decide to become a dentist or a postman. For me, writing is like being gay. You finally admit that this is …
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Colm Toibin: Of Hidden and Difficult Things
I write with a sort of grim determination to deal with things that are hidden and difficult, and this means, I think, that pleasure is out of the question. I …
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Harper Lee: Of Divine Discontent
Any writer worth his salt writes to please himself…It’s a self-exploratory operation that is endless. An exorcism of not necessarily his demon, but of his divine discontent. – Harper Lee
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Anais Nin: Creating a world of one’s own
Why one writes is a question I can answer easily, having so often asked it of myself. I believe one writes because one has to create a world in which …
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Roald Dahl: No master except his soul
A person is a fool to become a writer. His only compensation is absolute freedom. He has no master except his own soul, and that, I am sure, is why …
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John Green: Home amid suffering
I believe there is hope for us all, even amid the suffering – and maybe even inside the suffering. And that’s why I write fiction, probably. It’s my attempt to …
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Gloria E. Anzaldúa: Being more intimate with myself
Why am I compelled to write? . . . Because the world I create in the writing compensates for what the real world does not give me. By writing I …
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Sylvia Plath: Order life in sonnets
I want to write because I have the urge to excel in one medium of translation and expression of life. I can’t be satisfied with the colossal job of merely …
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Nicole Krauss: Rephrasing the world
Why does one begin to write? Because she feels misunderstood, I guess. Because it never comes out clearly enough when she tries to speak. Because she wants to rephrase the …
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