Why Write? | India Writes

Harper Lee on self-discipline and thick hide.

September 13, 2014September 13, 2014 - by India Writes Network

Writing is a process of self-discipline you must learn before you can call yourself a writer. There are people who write, but I think they’re quite different from people who …

Haruki Murakami: Talent, Focus, and Endurance

August 29, 2014August 29, 2014 - by India Writes Network

In every interview I’m asked what’s the most important quality a novelist has to have. It’s pretty obvious: talent. Now matter how much enthusiasm and effort you put into writing, …

Maya Angelou: On how to write a poem and Harlem Hopscotch

August 28, 2014August 28, 2014 - by India Writes Network

Like a pianist runs her fingers over the keys, I’ll search my mind for what to say. Now, the poem may want you to write it. And then sometimes you …

Ngugi wa Thiongo: Writing for Peace

August 16, 2014March 29, 2015 - by India Writes Network

There are certain images in literature, especially children’s literature, which live long in one’s memory. The encounter between Sindbad and the old man of the sea, for instance, has always …

Virginia Woolf: The creative benefits of keeping a diary

August 6, 2014August 6, 2014 - by India Writes Network

I got out this diary and read, as one always does read one’s own writing, with a kind of guilty intensity. I confess that the rough and random style of …

Chinua Achebe: You have struggle and story, and these two are quite enough for me.

July 30, 2014July 30, 2014 - by India Writes Network

Good stories attract us and good stories are also moral stories. I’ve never seen a really good story that is immoral, and I think there is something in us which …

Joseph Conrad: Art is long and life is short, and success is very far off.

July 29, 2014 - by India Writes Network

A work that aspires, however humbly, to the condition of art should carry its justification in every line. And art itself may be defined as a single-minded attempt to render …

Zadie Smith’s 10 Rules of Writing

July 28, 2014 - by India Writes Network

When still a child, make sure you read a lot of books. Spend more time doing this than anything else. When an adult, try to read your own work as …

Charles Bukowski: So You Want To Be A Writer

July 26, 2014July 26, 2014 - by India Writes Network

So you want to be a writer if it doesn’t come bursting out of you in spite of everything, don’t do it. unless it comes unasked out of your heart …

Don DeLillo: Understanding the rigors of novel-writing

July 18, 2014July 18, 2014 - by India Writes Network

I was a semiconscious writer in the beginning. Just sat and wrote something, or read the newspaper, or went to the movies. Over time I began to understand, one, that …