Mary Gordon Quotes

It is very enjoyable, writing a story. You get this idea. It takes hold of you. And then you spend day and night thinking about how to do it. And then you do it. And much later, you think, 'Oh, yes. That's an interesting question.'

For me, inspiration isn't a sort of spark which lights the fire of the story. It's more like a thread, one of many, which you can tease out of a story once it's written, if you feel so inclined.

I've never had a writer's block, but still I think: 'Is it going to happen this time?' You never know what you're going to get; you just put your fingers on the keys and hope.

I used to get up and write every day, even if I wasn't working on a specific thing. Now, when I have a thing I'm in the middle of, I do that, but when I'm not, time can go by when I'm not writing at all.

And once I know what the first page is, then the rest will come.

I'm a writer who likes to be influenced.

I never actually plan sequels. They demand to be done.

I'm one of the lucky writers: plots come easily to me.

I've always kind of wrote when I wanted to. Once I get the idea in my head and get it outlined out, I usually just sit and write until it's done.

I have every sympathy for writers. It's a mystery to me what they do. I can edit. I can cross out and say, 'I'm not saying that' or, 'How about we move this to here? Wouldn't that make that bit of the story better?' But where any of it comes from is beyond me. I will never write a play or a novel.

I always believed that whatever had to be written would somehow get itself written.

I have reached the point where I know that as long as I sit down to write, the ideas will come. What they will be, I don't know.

Neophyte writers tend to believe that there is something magical about ideas and that if they can just get a hold of a good one, then their futures are ensured.

I think all writers write from the time they're really young, and you just start asking the question, 'What if?'

My books start almost before I realise it. Once in a while, some accident causes an idea to rise to the surface and say: 'now.'

A lot of the time writers are just sponges... for what's around them, and so books are helpful for focusing your mind and literally putting it into words.

I'm not a believer that you have to write every day. If I felt industrious, I'd spend ten hours a week writing. The writing is going on all the time in my head; the trick is to capture it. Showers are great. Traffic jams are great.

When I sit at my table to write, I never know what it's going to be until I'm under way. I trust in inspiration, which sometimes comes and sometimes doesn't. But I don't sit back waiting for it. I work every day.

I think there is often a 'what if' proposition that gets me thinking about all my novels.

I can't write every day. I have to skip a day in between. If I try to do it every day, nothing comes.

Writing is a mysterious process, and many ideas come from deep within the imagination, so it's very hard to say how characters come about. Mostly, they just happen.

I tend to have an endless number of ideas for writing projects. I don't necessarily say that as a good thing. Maybe it's a good thing, but I have ideas for all kinds of projects: contemporary novels, graphic novels, anything that happens to go through my mind.

I write all the time, even if it means recording in the hotel room. I write on the plane, anywhere, anytime I'm inspired or have ideas.

Don't force yourself to write. Some people can write a novel in a few months, whereas for others it can take over a year. I'm lucky to be one of the former - but, even so, if I'm not in the mood to write, I won't. I'll go off, do something else and come back to it when I'm ready.

I'm not one of those writers I learned about who get up in the morning, put a piece of paper in their typewriter machine and start writing. That I've never understood.