David Foster Wallace Quotes

When I grow up I would like to be an artist in France.

You don't necessarily have to write to be a poet. Some people work in gas stations and they're poets. I don't call myself a poet, because I don't like the word. I'm a trapeze artist.

I wanted to be an artist, because it's a much better scam than being an architect.

I always thought being an artist was a lazy job. I was wrong.

The reason I did fashion was it was the only way to get paid to do anything creative. You couldn't support yourself as an 'artist' - I hate that word. The only way you could be 'arty' was as a fashion photographer, because it still had a certain amount of integrity involved.

I like being a writer.

You're an artist when you're writing, a businessperson the rest of the time.

Writing is a creatively rewarding occupation but for me very time consuming.

To be able to create a character and tell a story is a crazy way to make a living. I feel so lucky to be able to do this.

By the time I was 12, I had decided to be an artist.

I believe that filmmaking is a brilliant thing to do - be doing - for a living.

I wanted to be an artist; it was be an artist or be an actor.

I think that some of the writing, directing, and the content is better than a lot of movies sometimes. Actors, well artists in general - actors, writers, directors - what we all care about the most is good work and being able to create something that is really resonant and meaningful.

If creative work protects a man against mental illness, it is small wonder that he pursues it with avidity; and even if the state of mind he is seeking to avoid is no more than a mild state of depression or apathy, this still constitutes a cogent reason for engaging in creative work even when it brings no obvious external benefit in its train.

If you're writing, you're a writer. If you're talking about it or thinking about it, I'm not so sure. Writing is ninety-eight percent work and two percent magic.

Do whatever you do intensely. The artist is the man who leaves the crowd and goes pioneering. With him there is an idea which is his life.

It's hard not to be enthusiastic when you like what you're doing and I love what I do. I love writing stories, I love coming up with ideas for new projects and I love the people I work with, because I work with great writers and artists and directors and actors.

I make independent movies. I don't know how to do anything else. I don't know any other job that I could really get.

As an aspiring artist, you should strive for originality of vision. Have something to say and a fresh way of saying it. No story is worth the writing, no picture worth the making, if it’s not the work of the imagination.

If you want to be a stand-up comedian or an artist, you move to New York.

In terms of the economics, yes obviously the rise of e-books and how people choose to read books has a big effect on the economics of the game. But whether people are buying them on paper or downloading them there's still some poor wretch in a room who is trying to write a poem, write a story, write a novel. And so my job doesn't change. It's just how people receive it and economic conditions on the ground change, but that doesn't affect what I write.

I know what you're thinking - that anybody with proper sensitive feelings would rather scrub floors for a living. But I should scrub floors very badly, and I write detective stories rather well. I don't see why proper feelings should prevent me from doing my proper job.

Artists aren't looking for you to write them something; they're looking for you to give them something new.

We're artists too, but we do a good job hiding it, don't we?

It's very simple... this banging around with a camera and typewriter as a business is just one helluva lot of fun.