Paul Gallico Quotes

I'm a firm believer in putting your experiences in your writing, of bleeding into the page.

In order to move others deeply we must deliberately allow ourselves to be carried away beyond the bounds of our normal sensibility.

I feel like I really tapped into a pretty honest emotional place for myself as a lyricist. There's a broad spectrum of emotions.

When I started to write 'Hannah's Child,' I realized that this had to be a book of passion, to have a certain kind of vulnerability. I think that people respond to that.

Sometimes I would write something that was so private, people would say, 'Make it more universal.' I never liked that idea. I always thought the more personal a song was, the more people would want to hear it.

I never wanted to grow a thicker skin; I felt a real sense of pride in my thin skin, and in a weird way, I still do, because it's my thin skin that allows me to empathize with other people. It's the thing that allows me to create vulnerable art. It's the thing that allows me to create other feelings and make songs that actually grab people and touch people. I feel like I've spent my life fighting that thicker skin because I don't want to become an embittered asshole.

The poet should touch our heart by showing his own

I don't consciously try to take my readers on a journey as I don't really think about my readers when I'm writing. I just try to write what I feel passionately about, to tell a story down onto the page.

Wear your heart on the page, and people will read to find out how you solved being alive.

I show them the funny part, the silly part, the laughing part, the crazy part and then the really deep, deep part where I'm talking from my heart to these people. Because I've been through everything they've been through.

Fiction, at its best, is a radical act of intimacy. It seeks to join, to merge, to know deeply; and, as with intimacy, there is a way in which it cannot be faked.

I use myself for each part. Naturally, it's my body, it's my soul, it's my feelings. That's the only way I know how to work. I couldn't pretend.

Even if the songs are at times painful - 'cause some of the songs are not all roses and balloons; some of them dig into deep things that I've been going through - there's a joy that I think people feel from my music and, hopefully, from my performance because I am so in love with doing what I do.

I can't constantly be trying to write the unwritten song, the song that the 15-year-old girl needs. I need to write the song that I need.

With 'A Northern Light,' I've already heard from teenage readers, teachers, librarians - it's been so gratifying. It's amazing that you can take something that matters so deeply to you and make it matter to someone else.

I tell students they will know they are getting somewhere when a scene is so painful they can just barely bring themselves to write about it. A writer has to draw blood.

It's no accident many accuse me of conducting public affairs with my heart instead of my head. Well, what if I do? Those who don't know how to weep with their whole heart don't know how to laugh either.

I don't like acting things; I like feeling things.

You're creating an intimacy that everybody feels, that it's their experience, not yours. I'll never introduce a song and say, now this song is about 'my' broken heart.

I need to let people know who I am and instead of just trying to make great records, just be honest and make it more personal and make it more passionate, to make records with emotion and not be afraid to express that.

I live my life pretty emotionally, for better and for worse. I'm pretty thin-skinned and transparent. I lead with my heart, and I wanted to make a movie that did the same.

Human emotion is more interesting than anything. Everything that is so overtly sexual is not real. Real emotion is sexy. It's vulnerable and raw.

People in day-to-day life tend to skim the surface of things and be polite and careful, and that's not the language I speak. I like talking about feelings, fears and memories, anguish and joy, and I find it in music.

If Rihanna stripped it all down morally rather than with her clothes, perhaps we'd get closer to Nina Simone. She's talented, but all we want is to sing the truth. If Britney Spears was to sing closer to her heart, she might have been the new Bobby Gentry or Dolly Parton.

As a fan, I connect with realness. Whether it's strong or vulnerable, if it's real, I can connect with it.