Writing Quotes - Page 845

Mickalene [Thomas] is an artist that I have admired for a long time. So much of her work inspires me - I spend time looking at her work when I'm writing. I feel like we're working toward the same themes, and I see our work in conversation, whether we know it or not.

In grad school, a friend and I gave ourselves the task of writing poems in the voice of Beyoncé and Lady Gaga after they did the collaboration for "Telephone." I just kind of kept going. That was quite a while ago - Beyoncé meant something very different then than she does now.

So much of my writing process is trying to eliminate any kind of shame or fear of the thoughts that I'm having.

I'm working on a young adult novel. I've been working on it for a while, because I don't know how to write a novel and I'm teaching myself. For that reason, I've been reading a lot of YA [young adults], which I never have before. It's totally new to me.

So much of my writing process is trying to eliminate any kind of shame or fear of the thoughts that I'm having. Where I would usually backspace, I stop and say, "You know what? This is important, that I say how I feel and don't sugarcoat it, and don't avoid it." In my experience when I do try to avoid something, it makes its way into the work anyway. To be in front of it and just make friends with it is easier for me.

After a while, being so honest and so vulnerable on the page ends up affecting my own kind of self possession in the world, because I am not afraid of myself and my own thoughts. I think so much of being a woman, of being a social being, of being polite, is quieting those thoughts. There's so much we try not to say as we go through the day. There's a lot of tempering and self-editing. It is a relief to make writing that space where I don't need to do that.

Being a better songwriter, that's top of the list because I think that is a very intimidating, difficult task. I really admire people that just continue to write and get stronger.

Writing I think, out of what all of us do, writing is the hardest. You're the only who start with nothing except what's up here. You do that. It's really hard I think, acting is not.

If you sat down and you wrote a script, you may write something that's way beyond what you've ever seen me do, but if you thought of me to do it, I would be flattered to be asked to do something other than be wise.

If you're writing a novel, you're in a room for three or four years. There's not much coming in from the outside.

A novel may take anywhere from two to five years to write and, in the end, you might manage a couple of thousand dollars on it, no more.

Everybody writes a book too many.

I'm totally convinced I can write the perfect pop song.

It's often hard to determine, especially in early drafts, whether or not a story has a bona fide complication. Remember this: A complication must either illuminate, thwart, or alter what the character wants. A good complication puts emotional pressure on a character, promoting that character not only to act, but to act with purpose.If the circumstance does none of these things, then it's not a complication at all - it's a situation. This situation, or setup, might be interesting or even astonishing, but it gives the story no point of departure.

Better known as the Secret of the Golden Flower, this is a famous neidan text that the Western world came to know through Richard Wilhelm's 1929 translation. The Chinese text used by Wilhelm was edited by Zhanran Huizhen zi in 1921. Besides this, at least five more versions are available, all of which date to the late Qing dynasty (1644-1911) and are ascribed to Lu Dongbin, who revealed them through spirit writing.

The thought of writing was always pleasant, but the process was painful

Writing is a deeply immersive experience. When the words are flying, the house could be burgled and I wouldn’t notice. I have a low boredom threshold and I like intensity – writing is a way of escaping the quotidian.

I started writing 'Brick Lane' when my children were two years and five months old. We were on holiday in the north of England when I was overtaken by a compulsion to start writing.

Kids are naturally inventive and curious and creative, but most adults have had that beaten out of them. Writing is a form of play; you have to get rid of all those internal censors that we adults have, the things that say, 'Don't go there, that's not allowed.

Writers collect stories of rituals: John Cheever putting on a jacket and tie to go down to the basement, where he kept a desk near the boiler room. Keats buttoning up his clean white shirt to write in, after work.

I unplug the phone and close the door and just stick with it. I don't ever go out for lunch and I don't take vacations. I like to be awake when no one else is: either just before dawn in the morning or late, late at night. Silence helps.

I enjoy the optimism of design, even though we can see it as doomed. But I'm telling most people that I'm not writing about design any more this year. It makes no sense at all during the recession unless you write about sustainable or ethical design-very basic things, like how to get clean water in countries with a shortage of it.

I definitely have loads of respect for writers and the art of writing.

I'm very driven by writing.

I barely have time to watch stuff that I'm in, or my friends' stuff. The bar for writing has really elevated and it's really exciting, it's not just parts for 25-year-olds.