Quotes About Writing

I think most fiction writers naturally start by writing short stories, but some of us don't. When I first started writing, I just started writing a novel. It's a hard way to learn to write. I don't recommend it to my students, but it just happens that way for some of us.

One handy piece of equipment, which I recommend to any writer of fiction, is a set of Myriorama cards. I consult them frequently.

A recommendation to scholars: Write only one book about Lincoln; give it your best shot, and then move on.

I write chronologically in my life, so whatever's going on, I write about it. Usually, that's when I feel the most cohesive body of work is formed. I got to live this crazy life, I got to write about it, and now I've got this record that I'm really proud of, too. It's not done, but when I put it out, it's gonna be good.

When I first got my record deal, I was like, 'I just want to sing,' and I never put much thought into what really goes into a record. But as I got older, I developed a passion for writing.

Now, one can often get away with playing music by ear when it is not being recorded, but writing is another matter; its mistakes are not forgotten because they are still there to confuse us.

After the novel was published, I came to feel that I couldn't call myself Orthodox anymore. It's so patriarchal, anti-women, anti-gay. There was something about writing 'Disobedience'... it felt like I had put it all in the book. I had done my best by it, recorded what it meant for me. I felt I was done.

I think a lot of the Mothers stuff that we recorded was written while we were on the road.

I'm the guy that gets up at three in the morning to jot down an entire sheet of lyrics for something that won't be recorded for six months. You have to get it down when you can, because thoughts are fluid.

It helps to write as the character that I am trying to be, and try to journal every day as them. Once I've already recorded thoughts as this person, it's easier to just flip back through and be like, 'Oh, yeah, this is what she's thinking; this is what she's feeling.'

When I talk about what I'm feeling, I can get outside of it and analyze it. I think that process, especially on 'Sprained Ankle,' happened after it was recorded. All of those songs are just documentations of how I felt at that time. I was writing them because I needed to.

When I started off in music, I started with a real innocence, a real love for the instrument, the writing the songs, the playing the songs and the sharing and the recording and experimenting. It was exciting. Then, this thing called success came, and something happened at some point where I became disenchanted, and I lost the innocence.

I've just been recording mostly acoustic stuff, drums, and sax, and electric guitar. I'm just still writing songs and what not.

The main reason he wanted to be a recording artist was because it gives you much more freedom in your writing. You only have to please the artist and the artist is you so you can be more daring and experimental.

Each one of us had a little story to tell and each recording was based on that. Lou played all of the music but we both sort of kicked around some cords during the writing phase.

When it comes to the recording and writing, it's still mostly Mickey and I. But now there's this whole live entity that's a whole different thing, and it seems to be where we're gaining the most popularity.

Trying to get my music performed live by bar bands was a self defeating experience. It really just distracted me from what I should've been doing all along, writing and recording.

I was working at a non-profit for five years. But I could always create music after work. All throughout those years, I was writing songs and recording music and performing around town.

When I left politics in the early Eighties and started writing and recording, my idea was that I could have an influence further down into other generations. That Natives could come into the culture through arts and music.

I started writing out all of my feelings, and people asked me, 'Have you ever thought of recording your music?' It was something I'd always thought of, but I'd never really had the confidence.

I started writing when I was, like, eleven. We couldn't afford private lessons, so I had to teach myself how to sing through recording songs on GarageBand.

I want to start recording and writing as soon as I can and get music that I love out as soon as possible.

'Hairdresser Blues' was written when I was deep in a ten-year depression that I escaped shortly after recording that album. I don't like that album.

Well 'The Pod F. Tompkast,' as much as I love the result of it, was a really labor intensive show. There's a lot of writing, there's a lot of scheduling, there's a lot of recording - it's not a show that we can necessarily do in one day because there are so many moving parts to it.