Ann Patchett Quotes

Art is really predicated upon the experiences that you've had in your life. You only have to share what you've consumed.

My life is at least as intricate as my readers' lives. People say that 'The Artist's Way' changed their lives, but when they talk about 'Floor Sample,' they tell me, 'I was with you all the way.'

Inspiration for my music just comes from, you know, my life experiences.

People think that whatever I put into strips has happened to me in my life.

I also thought of playing improvisational jazz and I did take lessons for a while. At first I tried to write fiction by making up things that were completely alien to my life.

I can't write music unless I'm deeply connected to it and that connection almost always comes from some experience that I have had or am having.

I wouldn't say that my songs are autobiographical.

I don't draw on my inner life in my work.

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.

When I write for myself, I think about myself and draw from my own experience.

Ultimately, I don't think you can be a character who's completely alien or divorced from your own personality. It's probably true of every writer - it's probably true of every filmmaker, every songwriter - that, ultimately, every character you create is a facet of yourself.

When you write, what's going on in your life shines through in the songs.

When you're writing songs for yourself, as all artists do, it's about 'me.' It's about what you feel and your emotions. You're trying to get something out of your system about your experiences.

All my novels are very much directly related to my inner life, even though I'm inventing characters, even though it's fiction, even though it's make-believe, it nevertheless is coming out of the deepest recesses of myself.

As I always have with stand-up or anything, you kind of draw on what you're going through in your life.

All my work comes out of my life.

I've been building a fiction in part around the Marfa poem since my brief residency there, which has kept it from receding into the past.

When I'm writing, I'm constantly thinking about myself, because it's the only experience I have to draw on. And I don't see an exact reflection of myself in every face in the audience, but I know that my songs have validity to them, and that's why the fans are there.

Most things I go through I have to write about.

You're always going to write and draw inspiration from things that you're feeling, things that you've felt. It's kind of impossible not to unless you're writing a song and there's an exact scenario that you're trying to write a song for.

When I look at the majority of my own songs they really came from my own sense of personal confusion or need to express some pain or beauty - they were coming from a universal and personal place.

My works are an imitation of my own past and present.

I never have used any other artist as a model for a sound or a song. It always has to come from an emotion, and capturing the essence of that emotion in a song.

For me, all the materials and objects I employ come from a specific space that's very personal.

Of course, all writers draw upon their personal experiences in describing day-to-day life and human relationships, but I tend to keep my own experiences largely separate from my stories.