Naguib Mahfouz Quotes

Actually, I can't remember when I was not writing.

I'm a compulsive storyteller, an avid reader, and have always nurtured the secret goal of spending my life as a writer.

I'm not sure if I always wanted to be a writer, but I was always writing.

How do we live the writer's life? There's only one simple answer: 'we write.'

I felt that I had to write. Even if I had never been published, I knew that I would go on writing, enjoying it and experiencing the challenge.

Probably I, like a lot of people, became a writer in imitation of or in homage to the books I enjoyed. When you're so captivated by something, you think, could I do that? Hmm, let me try.

I started writing one afternoon when I was twenty, and ever since then I have written every day. At first I had to force myself. Then it became part of my identity, and I did it without thinking.

Every time I finish a book, I say to an imaginary god that I do not believe in, 'Please let me live to write another one.'

My true nature, I believe, is writing.

I get an urge, like a pregnant elephant, to go away and give birth to a book.

You cannot write a book unless it is totally inhabiting your imagination and you are totally engrossed with it. Which is a kind word for obsession.

More than anything, that's been the thread through my life - the desire to write, the impulse to write. I mean, it's taken me other places, but it was the impulse to write that led me to singing.

Although I always loved reading and putting words on paper, I never thought about becoming a writer until I was twelve.

I write because I feel driven to write. I write from a sense of inner necessity. I don't write for anything other than that.

I don't remember a time when I didn't define myself as a writer.

I started writing to please myself, a story I would like to read, and that is still true.

Ninety-five percent of all writers who write do not get published, but 100 percent of all writers write because they have a voice in their head. The vast majority of writers simply write because they have to.

Understand, I had absolutely no interest in writing; I wanted to be a Writer.

Being a writer was never a choice, it was an irresistible compulsion.

I cannot recall any moment of clarity about becoming a writer. I always liked to read. That's what did it.

I even dream about writing. I'm talking seeing words across the page, whole paragraphs.

I've always been a writer and have always loved writing.

I like to write and that's why I write. I don't think about how much the book will sell.

I love being a writer so much that I almost can't believe that I am one.

I've always wanted to write a book. And it turned out that it was more about finding a story that I felt I was necessary for, that no-one else could write.