Marilyn Hacker Quotes

I became a connoisseur of that nasty thud a manuscript makes when it comes through the letter box.

I grew up around books. When I first held the book and it was a substantive, tangible thing, and I thought of all the work that went into it, not just my work but everybody else's and the research and so forth, there's a sense of really have done something worthwhile.

What all my years in improvisation taught is that - if you're going to grow as a performer - you have to try some new things. You've got to be willing to take a few risks.

It wasn't until I was 26 or 25 when I started sending work out to magazines.

I think what I would say to my younger self, and probably to younger, just starting-out writers is that a lot of times you're just afraid to put yourself out there, and it's uncomfortable because it's working up the courage to do something, to push yourself to do those things.

I coauthored my first nonfiction book by the time I was 25. I have been involved in nonfiction documentaries, newspapers, TV and internet since that time.

I enjoy writing. Publishing... not so much. I've been lucky to work with some very talented people in the publishing world, and the print industry has allowed me to write full time.

After I've sent my revised draft to my agent and editor, they suggest more improvement sand again, this revision phase can take anywhere from a few hours to a few months.

I would like to do theatre because it scares me, and I think you should do things that scare you.

I was so naive about writing, I went to the public library and checked out the only volume they had on the topic - an academic treatise about publishing from the WWII era.

It took me way beyond what I knew, into places of which I was totally scared, but as I became less frightened, I welcomed new ways of thinking and approaching something. It made me an infinitely richer person, and I think a better musician.

If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it.

Somewhere along the line, I realized that I liked telling stories, and I decided that I would try writing. Ten years later, I finally got a book published. It was hard. I had no skills. I knew nothing about the business of getting published. So I had to keep working at it.

TO preach a sermon or edit a newspaper were the two things in life which I always felt I could do with credit to myself and benefit to the world, if I only had the chance.

I'm writing a book. I've got the page numbers done.

Find out what happened and put it in the paper

If I'm doing something I know I can pull off, then that's not the book I should be writing.

Publishing is not my world.

Getting out any weekly magazine requires many hours of reading, choosing, discarding, and thinking beyond the obvious.

I think anyone can do a book if they want to, it's just timing- wise.

Getting your work published is a major struggle.

I got a lot of great life lessons from the entertainment industry. The first was being able to feel comfortable taking risks.

One of the epiphanies I had was that I got into publishing because I love literature.

I completely follow my gut and do what I like doing. I have become impulsive in a good way. I am taking creative risks as an actor.

Me becoming a person, instead of somebody who just hides and is afraid, has happened in tandem with me learning to write music and become a good songwriter.