Jacqueline Woodson Quotes

There are no sure answers, only better questions.

I think it's normal that for a part of your life you have a lot of questions, and you're interested in all possible theories.

I don't think writers should write about answers. I think writers should write about questions.

Every time you do something, make something, it's final in a way, but it's not. It immediately raises a great set of questions. And if you become a question addict, which I am, you immediately have something you need to pursue.

Uncertainty is a very good thing: it's the beginning of an investigation, and the investigation should never end.

For me, there are no answers, only questions, and I am grateful that the questions go on and on. I don't look for an answer because I don't think there is one. I'm very glad to be the bearer of a question.

Most directors that I've worked with - I've worked with before, especially in Holland - and they know that I'm somebody who talks and asks, and talks, and talks, and talks and questions and turns things around. I'm like a little cat, walking around my little nest until I find my place.

I have always been much better at asking questions than knowing what the answers were.

I like to write about questions that interest me, not the conclusions I've come to.

I am really more interested in questions than in giving answers.

We learn more by looking for the answer to a question and not finding it than we do from learning the answer itself.

To me, what is important in the theater is that we don't want to make a conclusion. We don't want to make a statement, don't want to say what something is. We want to ask, 'What is it?'

The reason you work as an artist is to stay open and ask questions.

I don't have the answers. But I am asking the questions, and that's the fun part. I'm like the kid in class with his hand up, going, 'Um...' I think that's a powerful place to create from.

I'm inspired by questions I have that I try to figure out the answers to through my writing.

You want to question what is important and why is it important. I don't have all the answers, but I'm very curious to know and learn.

Each time I make a movie, it's a little bit like taking another course in something because there's an argument between these people that I don't necessarily have an answer to.

The only way we can fly planes and use computers is because people were curious about their world and also skeptical about the things they were told to be immutable, so they figured out other ways of doing things.

I always start out with an idea, even a boring idea, that becomes a question I don't have answers to.

I believe in not quite knowing. A writer needs to be doubtful, questioning. I write out of curiosity and bewilderment.

There's something that doesn't make sense. Let's go and poke it with a stick.

I think that artists provide questions, not answers. We provide provocations rather than fully formed objects.

It's the duty of art to ask questions, not to provide answers. And if you want a clearer answer, I'll have to pass.

All great discoveries...are products as much of doubt as of certainty, and the two in opposition clear the air for marvelous accidents.

Asking is the first step in the Creative Process, so make it a habit to ask.