Louisa May Alcott Quotes

The best poems come from the world, go through the poet, and go back in to the world.

The creations of a great writer are little more than the moods and passions of his own heart, given surnames and Christian names, and sent to walk the earth.

Well, 'The Wellspring' was written from 1983 to 1986. And it had a section in the beginning that was poems that began from others' experience.

I'm inspired by playwrights, novelists, poets: The value of language has been a lifelong passion of mine. I enjoy it. I'm good at it.

I have a slightly bad back, which has made an enormous contribution to American literature.

I began writing early - very, very early... I was already writing short stories for the radio and selling poems to poetry and art festivals; I was involved in school plays; I wrote essays, so there was no definite moment when I said, 'Now I'm a writer.' I've always been a writer.

Whatever's going on with me at the time of writing is going to find its way into the piece. If that doesn't happen, then what the hell am I doing? So if I'm writing 'Inglourious Basterds,' and I'm in love with a girl and we break up, that's going to find its way into the piece.

I often draw from people in my own experience to base a character on, going back to my days with Mike Leigh.

I think, no matter what, when you're writing songs, most people write about the extremes of their experiences.

The desire to create literature leads to frights, grunts, and coy looks.

I like the feeling of being able to confront an experience and resolve it as art.

My advice to would-be young authors is to read a lot, write a lot, and not worry about creating a finished product. Keeping a journal is not a bad idea either.

What will they say about my poetry who never touched my blood?

Popular poets are the parish priests of the Muse, retailing her ancient divinations to a long since converted public.

I concentrate on character, theme, language, structure, voice. It actually surprises me that no matter what I write, people declare it "intently political." I'm just writing about the world I know, as it is. Wounds and griefs included.

I write every day, for most of the day, so it's just about turning into metaphor whatever's going on in my life, in the world, and in my head. Every nightmare, every moment of grief or joy or failure, is a moment I can convert into cash via words. I use everything. Turning life into stories is how I make sense of my experience.

I'm interested in art, and I think about the process of making art. It's part of my personality, my experience of the world, so it ends up in the movies. It's where my head is.

To the scientist Nature is a storehouse of facts, laws, processes; to the artist she is a storehouse of pictures; to the poet she is a storehouse of images, fancies, a source of inspiration; to the moralist she is a storehouse of precepts and parables; to all she may be a source of knowledge and joy.

You know, I didn't write my books for critics and scholars. I wrote them for students and artists. When I hear how much my work has meant to them--well, I can't tell you how happy that makes me. That means that this great stuff of myth, which I have been so privileged to work with, will be kept alive for a whole new generation. That's the function of the artists, you know, to reinterpret the old stories and make them come alive again, in poetry, painting, and now in movies.

Every song has a different genesis, or feeling. Usually the lyrics, I don't really know what it's all about, I just kinda do it. I mean, there's a combination of, like you're saying, that kind of lyrics about commitment or vaguely relationship lyrics mixed with jokey 90s Beck-style non-sequiturs and stuff.

I know very well what Goethe meant when he said that he never had a chagrin but he made a poem out of it. I have altogether too much patience of this kind.

Singing has nothing to do with the affairs of this world: it is not for the law. Singers are merry, and free from sorrows and cares.

A fine work of art - music, dance, painting, story - has the power to silence the chatter in the mind and lift us to another place.

When I am asked about influences, I always say I bow down to Fred Astaire, because when you look at him dancing you never look at his extremities, do you? You look at his centre. What you never see is the hours of work that went into the routines, you just see the breathtaking spirit and freedom.

I do write, but for now I am keeping it all in the desk drawer. I have always written. The only book that I have published was "Revolution," during the election campaign, a book that contains both personal and political chapters. I have never been happy with what I have written, including three novels that, from my point of view, are incomplete.