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Quotation(s) of the Week: John Ashbery

by Erika Dreifus on
2

Thanks to Sage Cohen, I have very recently discovered the Read Write Poem site. And thanks to that site, I have found not one, but SEVEN quotations from poet John Ashbery.

That’s because the last time I looked, Read Write Poem was polling visitors to see “Which John Ashbery quote applies to you?” Here are the choices:

“My own autobiography has never interested me that much. Whenever I try to think about it, I seem to draw a complete blank.”

“There wasn’t enough space to paint but there was room to write, which is one of the advantages of being a writer.”

“I mention this because getting published is very much a result of chance and connections and all kinds of factors that, in my case, didn’t have anything to do with poetry.”

“So I wrote for myself, not in a narcissistic way, but because I felt I was doomed to be my chief reader.”

“I didn’t think there were going to be any readers therefore I wasn’t trying to annoy them.”

“I am aware of the pejorative associations of the word ‘escapist,’ but I insist that we need all the escapism we can get and even that isn’t going to be enough.”

“In fact, I rarely discuss my poetry. I find it distasteful. I’d rather not know much about it myself.”

Think about which quotation you might choose, and then head over to the site to see the poll’s results, if you’re curious!

Quotation of the Week: James Baldwin

by Erika Dreifus on
4

“You write in order to change the world, knowing perfectly well that you probably can’t, but also knowing that literature is indispensable to the world….The world changes according to the way people see it, and if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way…people look at reality, then you can change it.

–James Baldwin

Source: Epigraph (quoted at the opening) to Mary Pipher’s excellent 2006 book, Writing to Change the World.

Quotation of the Week: Willa Cather

by Erika Dreifus on
7

Once again, I bring you a quotation that came to me via The Southeast Review‘s writing regimen (although I do think I’ve heard it bandied about in the past).

“Most of the basic material a writer works with is acquired before the age of fifteen.” –Willa Cather

What do you think, practicing writers? Agree? Disagree? How is this quotation relevant (or not) to your own writing practice?

Quotation of the Week: Anne Rice

by Erika Dreifus on
2

I’ve subscribed to The Southeast Review‘s Writing Regimen for the month of December, and one benefit that I’m really appreciating is the receipt of a literary quotation each morning. Here’s one–sad but true–that I received over the weekend.

“Writers write about what obsesses them. You draw those cards. I lost my mother when I was 14. My daughter died at the age of 6. I lost my faith as a Catholic. When I’m writing, the darkness is always there. I go where the pain is.”
–Anne Rice