Annie Baker Quotes

I'm working when I'm fighting with my wife. I constantly ask myself-how can I use this stuff to literary advantage.

It's experiences in life that give us something to write about, and since good fiction is applied tension, you'll have an arsenal of good material if life hasn't been peachy (and not a whole lot if it has).

People seemed to think, you get to a certain age or you get married or you, you're comfortable. And so now there's nothing to write about: that angst is gone. The youthful angst. And that just hasn't happened with me.

I have this theory that anything that happens to you that leaves you alive and intact can be used somewhere in your writing.

I'm attracted to pathos, because life is mostly pathos. I've had a lot of it in my life.

I think I subconsciously put myself in these situations where the girlfriend isn't pleased with me. I'm useless as a boyfriend. That's how I managed to write all these songs.

Family life is tough, I'll say that for it. But in my case, I've mined the family. In a sense, I've used it. I've used what happened - the different events, the births of children, birthdays. Connecting, not connecting. Regret, shame, guilt. I mean, they're all in the songs. And love, too, I hasten to add.

Now, no matter what background you come from, there is nobody in this world who can say that their life is without troubles. Everybody faces problems at some point in their life. All that matters is how you deal with it.

I don't want someone else to go through and live through the life that I have had to live through in terms of the challenges that I face.

Any experience that isn't fun is probably something I will at least use in my writing someday.

I think everybody faces challenges in their lives. I've definitely been through it - not to the extreme that Astrid did. I try to keep some kind of identity and strength.

I'm not sure there's a difference between books that affected the way I see the world and books that influenced me as a writer.

I've had the big ups and the big downs.

When my father would yell at me, I told myself someday I'd use it in a book.

I've always thrived on getting a drive from different emotional circumstances that I'm going through.

I think everyone in their life goes through challenges, whether it's love or money, kids or illness... You have to really not run away from that stuff.

My own personality is fairly optimistic and generally very happy, but like everyone else I've been through difficult stuff, particularly in my teenage years, where I experienced enough melancholia to feed any number of electronic records.

People go through so much in life - financially, physically, mentally, and emotionally. So I don't look at the ups and downs as anything but a negligible area.

You can have ups and downs, and I know that as good as anybody because I've had them.

I don’t have a problem baring my emotions in music. That’s one of the reasons I’m glad to have music in my life. I’m pretty resilient as far as being a human being. A lot of songs write themselves.

I've been in a long and happy relationship for 22 years and it's never inspired me to write anything. It's too good - nothing to say. Problems, conflict, that's what makes for good stories.

I needed time to stand back and go through a lot more experience in life. Then I have something to write about, joke or to animate.

It's easier to write about heartbreak after you've had your heart broken. You have more material to draw from, you can extrapolate from your own experiences and make reasonable assumptions about how your characters would feel and act.

Life is a series of relapses and recoveries.

It definitely sometimes feels like a suit that I wish I could zip off. But I don’t feel bad about any of the things I’ve gone through, whether it’s divorce or breakups or anything like that, because that’s all part of the life journey, and I have those experiences just like anyone else. And I think it deepens what you tap into creatively.