Pat Conroy Quotes

Even as a feminist, my whole life I'd been waiting for a man to love who could love me. For decades, I'd thought that man would be my father. When I was 25, I met that man, and he was my brother.

It was really written as most, I think, books are by writers - for themselves. There was something that just had to be written, in a way that it had to be written. If you know what I mean.

First novels tend to be blood-lettings, and they're focused on you, not the reader.

I got down to business and started writing furiously. I wore my fingers down to a callous state writing with every Tom, Dick and Harry around the world, including a chap named Charlie who plays for a man named Bob, to wrestle my emotions and bring out the raw grit hiding in my tightly guarded sub-conscious.

Writing gave me a life.

However far fiction writers stray from their own lives and experiences - and I stray pretty far from mine - I think, ultimately, that we may be writing what we need to write in some way, albeit unconsciously.

It may sound very strange, but I love the freedom that writing a novel gives me. It is an unhindered experience. If I come after a bad day, I can decide that my protagonist will die on page 100 of my novel in a 350-page story.

A lot of banging in the head has built up over the decades, and for my own sanity, I needed to write. I wanted to see if I could tell an honest, organic story about characters that interest me.

I really enjoy the therapeutic value of writing songs.

I am, in some sense, a writer. Even though I kinda downplay the word thing, I do enjoy writing sometimes.

If I ever wrote a book, people would never believe it.

When I have worries, fears or a love affair, I have the luck of being able to transform it into a poem.

It can be really powerful to write something when you're sad.

Writing was my route to creative expression, and I needed to write about the things that interested me.

The whole point of writing is to have something in your gut or in your soul or in your mind that's burning to be written.

All writing is an act of self-exploration. Even a grocery list says something about you; how much more does a novel say?

I think everyone should sit down and write a book. It's a lot like therapy but a lot less expensive.

I so desperately hate to end these movies that the first thing I do when I'm done is write another one. Then I don't feel sad about having to leave and everybody going away.

Poems mesmerized me, and I felt better when I was writing them, or trying to - more in touch with something deep and dark within myself.

If something bothers me, it bothers me for a long time until I find a way to work it out. Music provided me with a means of working things out.

I love writing. I've pursued it with a passion.

My quest these days is to find my long lost inner child, but I'm afraid if I do, I'll end up with food in my hair and way too in love with the cats.

I wrote for nearly six hours. When I stopped, the dark mood, as if by magic, had folded its cloak and gone away.

I became an author because I love words. I enjoyed playing with them when I was a kid, writing stories and plays, and doing whatever I could think to do with words. I kept my love of them growing up and still love to see what they can do.

I love literature deeply. I view books as sacred things, and in writing my story, I'm going to do my best to honor the form that has played such a huge part in shaping who I am.