A lot of people understand what not saying anything means, so, in effect, not saying anything is really saying a lot.
Poetry is a kind of distilled insinuation. It's a way of expanding and talking around an idea or a question. Sometimes, more actually gets said through such a technique than a full frontal assault.
I've always believed that if you are precise in your thoughts, it's not the lines you say that are important - it's what exists between the lines. What I'm compelled by most is that transparency of thought, what is left unspoken.
A lot of times you get credit for stuff in your movies you didn't intend to be there.
Some people become so expert at reading between the lines they don't read the lines.
When people ask what 'American Pie' is about, they're missing the point. The song isn't about the lines themselves - it's about what is between the lines. The song is about what isn't there.
Messages hidden in the thickets of a story are the ones that burrow deepest because most of us don't realize that any burrowing is going on at all.
But novels are never about what they are about; that is, there is always deeper, or more general, significance. The author may not be aware of this till she is pretty far along with it.
You don't want to hit readers over the head like they're completely incapable of picking up on subtlety.
I can't stand innuendo. If I see one in a script I whip it out immediately.
Certain brief sentences are peerless in their ability to give one the feeling that nothing remains to be said.
I've had a wordless phase, and that's still not entirely over: what I sing is not always literally meant that way, and you can hear that in the way it is sung.
I've always believed you can get closer to the truth by pretending not to speak it.
If I asked for a cup of coffee, someone would search for the double meaning.
I have the feeling that all stories travel with an understory.
And it's interesting, but I'm always interested in the story behind the story.
It's what people don't say that is often the most revealing.
Shakespeare doesn't really write subtext, you play the subtext.
My writing is not just all facts and voices. I strive to create a text that works as a sign, pointing out undercurrents that lie beneath the facts.
