Mona Simpson Quotes

Writers are often alone when they work. Hours pass in silence as one long moment; light fades as day turns back to face the coming night.

I can handle a lot of work. I've always been able to. I'm a very focused individual. I come to my studio at about 7:30 in the morning and exit almost 5:00 P.M. In that time, those eight or nine hours, it's kind of laser focus on whatever I'm working on. There aren't really any distractions or anything.

When things aren't working out, we have a tendency to say, 'Go do other things,' but you shouldn't do other things. You need to stay at your desk and continue to try to write. You need to insist on it.

I can write best in the silence and solitude of the night, when everyone has retired.

Reading takes solitude and it takes focus.

When I write I find a quiet place.

If you really want to write, then shut yourself in a room, close the door, and WRITE. If you don't want to write, do something else. It's as simple as that.

I can do a book in three months if I spend all day, seven days a week at it and, in fact, I work better that way.

I am much more productive late at night because I have no one to look to for entertainment aside from myself.

Here in Seattle, I'm the most productive I've ever been. I don't allow myself personal distractions. I'm extremely disciplined here.

I work in silence.

When it is time to get to work, I go away completely and don't do anything except the work. And that can be 16 hours a day.

In business, in the music world, people know that I can be very friendly and warm but that, after a certain moment, the business is closed. I like to be alone: in order to concentrate on my work, the social life does not exist. It has never existed for me, really. I have chosen instead the working life because I prefer that.

I would rise, monk-like, at 6 A.M., speak to no one, make tea, and go immediately to my desk from which I didn't move until frills appeared around the edges of my eyes or I heard the sound of a wine bottle being uncorked. It would give the wrong impression to describe these as Writing Days.

You have to protect your writing time. You have to protect it to the death.

Something amazing happens when the rest of the world is sleeping. I am glued to my chair. I forget that I ever wanted to do anything but write. The crowded city, the crowded apartment, and the crowded calendar suddenly seem spacious. Three or four hours pass in a moment; I have no idea what time it is, because I never check the clock. If I chose to listen, I could hear the swish of taxis bound for downtown bars or the soft saxophone riffs that drift from a neighbor's window, but nothing gets through. I am suspended in a sensory deprivation tank, and the very lack of sensation is delicious.

You can write anytime people will leave you alone and not interrupt you.

I'm in lockdown mode as far as what I want to accomplish. I don't let anything else get in my way.

I am in total silence when I write - I don't even like the sound of the dryer going - I like the quiet.

I have a reputation for being hermitlike. I'm not. I'm just obsessed with my work.

Working with Michael Chiklis is a lesson in professionalism and staying focused. That's what Chiklis brings all day long.

I just think there are enough hours in the day. If you just focus and dedicate yourself and approach each task as it presents itself, you can accomplish a lot.

Concentration is my motto - first honesty, then industry, then concentration.

When you play, play hard; when you work, don't play at all.

I'm a higgledy-piggledy person in every way. On days that I work, I work for eight hours in a row, with my internet access entirely turned off, locked in my office.