Clyde Edgerton Quotes

I can write anywhere. I actually wrote more than I ever did when I had small children. My children were never a hindrance.

It seems to me that since I've had children, I've grown richer and deeper. They may have slowed down my writing for a while, but when I did write, I had more of a self to speak from.

I remember trying to write at 1, 1:30 A.M., and just sort of falling asleep. And I think that was actually a good creative state for weird ideas. I shifted to a morning schedule once I had two kids, and I still found that if I slept badly, I actually had better ideas.

If you stuff yourself full of poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, music, you automatically explode every morning like Old Faithful. I have never had a dry spell in my life, mainly because I feed myself well, to the point of bursting. I wake early and hear my morning voices leaping around in my head like jumping beans. I get out of bed to trap them before they escape.

I like kids but I also like the option to close the door. Becoming a parent is a whole other life, and it doesn't stop.

It's no coincidence that I began writing the day my daughter started school. I knew everything I knew before I began to write, but I was raising two children and didn't have the time to get to the typewriter.

I do not believe in inspiration, but I must have a title in order to work, otherwise I am lost.

I have no regrets about not having children. I still wait for the pang of guilt, but I have none. I tune into the television show 'Nanny 911' occasionally which reminds me how much patience and love it take to be a good parent.

When I became a parent and hit my thirties, I got my hands on an acoustic guitar. I started writing quiet, simple songs at home and, with a little encouragement, I got more courage and found my voice. I have people and movements who have inspired me to carry on, but I try to write about things I know, nothing too complicated, really.

I wrote my first novel when my daughter was about six months old.

I'd love to adopt, but having a daughter, Daisy, who's in the middle of her teens, I'm now thinking: Is this a time to start all over again or is this a time to realise those child-rearing years are over?

I keep a picture of my beloved children close by. Also, water and plenty of pads and pens.

I've never had writer's block.

For me, there's a big difference between having a baby in your 20s and having a baby in your 40s.

I don't believe in writer's block.

Do your kids a favor - don't have any.

Being a mother was too important to me to risk running out of time.

Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children, and no theories.

I really like Los Angeles. I like the weather, the openness of it, the beach, the mountains, the desert. I find it inspiring. I get quite a lot of writing done out there.

People say, 'How does having kids change your writing? Do you see the world through their eyes?' No - you just become a faster songwriter... In the old days, you'd be like, 'Oh I'm gonna work on this song for a few days.'

Anything that is profoundly energy-shifting - like having a child - is fodder for creative thought. So for me, I welcome it and look straight into it as something to learn from.

There's no writer's block; there's only distraction.

Sometimes I think about all the hours spent making lunches, carting kids from one place to another, being up in the middle of the night taking temperatures. People who haven't had to do that have, say, read every last book up there from cover to cover and probably remember it. There are trade-offs. But more life is more life.

I think having kids has been the biggest influence on my work since I started publishing.

I mean, the human race wouldn't continue if anyone told you how hard it is having kids, would it?