Quotes About Inspiration

With solos, I don't like to be too prepared going in - I like to surprise myself.

If they aren't real enough to surprise me, then they aren't real enough to go on the page.

I write fast. But it takes me a while to get going. It's very important for me to see my whole plot. I have to see the end first because I like a surprise in the end. Which is why I let characters and plot gestate in my mind.

I prefer to surprise myself as I'm writing. I'm not interested in it if I already know where it's going. So I have only the most general sense of what I'm doing when I start a story. I sometimes have a destination in mind, but how the story is going to go from Point A to Point Z is something I make up as I go along.

Scratch an artist and you surprise a child.

Close to the Edge, Red, One of a kind, Discipline, Earthworks, The Sound of Surprise, all seem to me to be albums that captured the essence of the intention.

It doesn't matter to me if it has a surprise ending or not. I usually go for the material or the project.

That element of surprise is what I look for when I am writing. It is my way of judging what I am doing - which is never an easy thing to do.

I don't know what the secret is when I am writing it - it really is a surprise to me.

I like working with kid actors because they surprise you constantly. I mean, all actors do - but kids particularly.

The most interesting things that happen in my books are usually the things that arise spontaneously, the things that surprise me.

I like the busy-ness of office life. What I discovered, to my surprise, is that I love the solitary nature of writing. What happens is that you write when you're ready.

I'm sure it came as no surprise to my friends and family when I became an illustrator and then a writer because, from about the age of five, I was one of those children who always had his nose in a book.

Each one seems to be, in some way, essentially different from the others, and each is a surprise to me. I think that making books, or any kind of art, might also be like mining. The artist digs into his or her life and imagination and never knows what they'll find. That's the adventure.

When I wrote my first serious novel, 'Interior', I was inspired by a 1978 book of Updike's, 'The Coup', which is set in Africa and will come as a delightful surprise to anyone who has only read his Americana.

I usually start with an ending, then outline high points of things that happen, and kind of make up the rest as I go along. Occasionally, the characters surprise me, and I wonder how we got here. Other times, the characters are stubborn and won't do something I want them to in the story.

There's this element of surprise when you're writing songs, like it's something outside of you that you get to be part of. And it's just exciting. And that's why I keep writing - because I like that feeling.

The director Steve McQueen has found a way to constantly include the element of surprise in his work, both as an artist and as a filmmaker.

In terms of the music, it feels almost like trouble's a good thing - you never know when a song is going to surprise you. We look for these subversive moments in songs.

Football is about dreams, about feeling a special sensation, giving a surprise, and inspiring joy.

No one works harder at inspiring athletes all over the world than our team at Nike. Creating those experiences requires an amazing amount of energy, a steady flow of big ideas to excite and surprise people, and a constant dialogue that connects us on a personal level.

The element of surprise is the most important thing and what keeps me interested in writing. I can feel it if I've written that predictable or boring line, and I will carry that around with me all day.

When I call 'Action,' I love to be surprised. And the actors I've been fortunate enough to work with always surprise me in the best ways.

I just surprise myself every day.