Guy Johnson Quotes

I think writing is such a great talent, and if I was better, I would love to be a writer.

I don't think there was a time I ever thought of myself as anything but a writer. I thought I was going to be the next Toni Morrison.

I always, always wanted to be a writer.

I knew that I wanted to be a writer even before I knew exactly what being a writer entailed.

I am, really, a great writer; my only difficulty is in finding great readers.

I had a strong desire to write and some free time.

I pretty much always wanted to be a writer.

I have been aspiring to write some sort of literature for a long time.

I've always wanted to be a writer. Ever since I learned to read, I've wanted to share stories with others the way my favorite writers shared their stories with me.

I always knew I wanted to be a writer.

I never studied writing, but I'd always been a reader and had a secret fantasy about being a writer.

If I did anything 'next', I would do writing.

Listen, I wrote 10 unsuccessful books before I broke through, so I'm looking all the time to keep my books fascinating. I want to write what people want to read, not push any message.

It's one thing you aspire to: someday, you'll be able to write a book.

I wanted to write stories for myself. At first it was purely an aesthetic thing about craft. I just wanted to become good at the art of something. And writing was very private.

When I started writing fiction, I knew how good it was immediately.

If you give me a typewriter and I'm having a good day, I can write a scene that will astonish its readers. That will perhaps make them laugh, perhaps make them cry - that will have some emotional clout to it. It doesn't cost much to do that.

You write, hoping to write a good book; that's it.

I don't think I knew I would be a writer. I wanted to become a writer, and I tried to write.

I still write the occasional short story, and poked at a novel once, but it's just not what I want to do.

I used to write stories a lot because you had to fill your hours some other way than watching television. So my imagination was vivid, and I used to write a lot of stories. I wrote a novel, which I still have, which is so awful.

I'm still learning my craft, and I've been writing since I was nine.

I was 17 when I decided to write stories as big as cathedrals, overflowing with the kind of memorable and audacious characters Walker Percy, Ernest Hemingway and Saul Bellow created.

A lot of people ask me, 'Are you born a writer?' And I don't think it's necessarily true. I just think what you either have or you don't is this ability to see something that's complex and worth talking about.

I felt like I was never going to be a great writer. I felt like I was going to be a good writer at best. I wanted to be great at something.