Natalia Ginzburg Quotes

Fortunately, I've never been very conscious and inhibited of what I have to do. The camera's my soul mate.

I never got nervous performing my own material.

Being a writer means taking the leap from listening to saying 'Listen to me'.

To me, writing is not a profession. You might as well call living a profession. Or having children. Anything you can't help doing.

A writer, or a beginning writer, is faced by the huge walls of self-consciousness. Most people think, "What if I say the wrong thing? What if I don't sound erudite and sophisticated? I'll be considered a fool." In time, with a lot of practice, you realize that's your foolishness is your gift.

Writing is one of the most assertive things a person can do.

I was always really shy. That's why being in front of cameras like this is uncomfortable. I found that when I was a kid, I would hide behind playing pretend. That's when I would come out of my shell. I would dress up as an old man or something and go out onto the street with my mom. I would come out of my shell that way. So I ended up stumbling into acting. It was the one thing that I found a passion for.

The best training is to read and write, no matter what. Don't live with a lover or roommate who doesn't respect your work. Don't lie, buy time, borrow to buy time. Write what will stop your breath if you don't write.

The key thing is, don't worry about if anyone is reading you or not. Figure out your voice and figure out what you want to write about, what you're good at, what you like doing.

The nice thing about being on stage is it's not that I know what to do, but I have a very clear feeling that anything I do is OK. All I'm up there to do is express how I feel. Any way I choose to do that is fine.

I can't point to a moment or incident that made me see that this business, this putting down words on paper, was what I would do for the rest of my lucid life. But apparently, that is my calling.

I just try to be true to myself and look the way that I'm comfortable looking. Because if I'm comfortable with me, then you're going to be comfortable with me as well.

Whatever it is you like to do, that's the sexiest part of you.

It's easier to say, 'Don't care about what anyone thinks,' than it is to actually not care about what anyone thinks. But, honestly, anything you're passionate about, that's what you'll be the best at.

There’s a great expression in Twelve Step programs: Act as if. Act as if you’re a writer. Sit down and begin. Act as if you might just create something beautiful, and by beautiful I mean something authentic and universal. Don’t wait for anybody to tell you it’s okay. Take that shimmer and show us our humanity. That’s your job.

I think that if you have to work very hard at dressing up and it makes you nervous or uptight, then you won't look very well because you won't be comfortable. I think it's much better to be comfortable and happy than well dressed.

I like to write music for fun. That's my hustle, my grind, my means of stayin' alive, and it's also my recreation, too.

You have to surrender to your mediocrity, and just write. Because it's hard, really hard, to write even a crappy book. But it's better to write a book that kind of sucks rather than no book at all, as you wait around to magically become Faulkner. No one is going to write your book for you and you can't write anybody's book but your own.

A writer, or any artist, can’t expect to be embraced by the people [but] you just keep doing your work - because you have to, because it’s your calling.

There probably is a lot of music that no one's ever gonna hear. For anyone doing music, just do exactly what it is that makes you want to do it. If you like listening to odd, strange, bizarre noise and that makes you want to create it, do it. Even if everyone around you tells you it's crap or thinks it won't work, someone out there is going to appreciate it.

Fashion's about taking chances, it's about taking risks, and just doing it the way you feel comfortable doing it. If you do that, people will respect it more.

And so I write the way I myself would like the book to be – if I were a child. I write for the child within me.

Advice to a new writer: There are no rules in this profession. Do what is good for you. Read books and watch films that stimulate your writing. In your writing, go where the pain is; go where the pleasure is; go where the excitement is. Believe in your own original approach, voice, characters, story. Ignore critics. Have nerve. Be stubborn.

The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it’s definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I’m not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.