Sheila Heti Quotes

Before Arthur, I'd dismissed altogether writing fiction. You only have so many semi-sharp arrows in your quiver, I'd told myself, and I was not going to be able to write a novel.

I didn't really want to be part of a clique or a niche. But I also was looking for my own voice, as a writer, y'know? And a world I could call my own.

I don't know how to write without thinking what people would want. You don't know whether they want you to be black or white, so you kind of get a gray, something in the middle.

My novels come from within me; they are things I feel I want to do.

All my friends who wanted to write had got nowhere trying to write the great European novel. So I deliberately steered clear of that and set out to write something story-led.

Writing is not a competitive sport. Everyone that writes has his or her own voice.

I save the best of myself for novels, and I believe it shows.

I do not just write, I write what I am. If there is a secret, perhaps that is it.

I was always writing the books that I wanted to write, books that demanded to be written at the time. But, like most writers, you start off feeling your way.

I don't even know how to define myself. I'm a person who writes. It's something I enjoy, and hopefully people enjoy it as well.

I don't exist without writing.

In effect I am not a novelist, but rather a failed essayist who started to write novels because he didn't know how to write essays.

Nothing beats novel writing because it's complete expression of you. You just control everything. Not even a movie director has that level of control.

But I do not have the reader in mind when I write. No true writer does that.

The most important thing for me as an artist is having an identity.

When I'm writing, I'm never trying to teach anything - maybe I'm trying to illuminate.

If I haven't any talent for writing books or newspaper articles, well, then I can always write for myself.

I think that anyone who is in any way creative or is creating something, whether an architect or fashion designer, I think if you have the opportunity to create something that is fully you, it frees your mind and your spirit and gives you the opportunity to really find yourself.

My goal is, no matter what genre or story, I'll find a personal angle. It doesn't have to be autobiographical, or specifically Asian-American. It has to explore a burning question that I have.

I've never thought of myself as a writer. I still don't, despite all the writing I've done.

You can't write ... on the strength of influence. You can only write a good story or a good novel by yourself.

It's hard enough for me to write what I want to write without me trying to write what you say they want me to write which I don't want to write.

I thought, if I write a book that is not a retelling of Pride and Prejudice, it's not going to mean that I will not get any criticism. I might as well write the book that I want to write.

... in nine out of ten cases the original wish to write is the wish to make oneself felt[ellipsis in source] the non-essential writer never gets past that wish.

Absolutely, I think coming out has allowed me to align who I am with with my creative self.