Writers' Purpose Quotes

Writing is a way of living. It doesn't quite matter that there are too many books for the number of readers in the world to read them. It's a way of being alive for the writer.

There are writers, and there are readers who want something more. They want to get at the grist of life.

Some people are able to not only entertain the public in any way that they can but also in some way to throw in some sort of inspirational message with the entertainment. I have always tried to do that with whatever I wrote. And I'm sure that a lot of other writers do, too.

Writers write to influence their readers, their preachers, their auditors, but always, at bottom, to be more themselves.

I feel my writing comes from a desire to... well, it's motivated by many things, but it's inherently a contradiction in that I'm writing for myself, and it's a very interior journey. On the other hand, I feel that writers do make that interior journey out of a desire to connect.

I didn't get into writing to make money or get famous or any of that. I got into it to hit hearts, and man, when I get letters not just from the soldiers but from their kids, especially their kids, it makes it all worthwhile.

Why do writers write? Because it isn't there.

Literature does not exist in a vacuum. Writers as such have a definite social function exactly proportional to their ability as writers. This is their main use.

Labels only confuse people. The smarter people recognize artists who transcend categories. But I always try to entertain. It's in my nature; writers are born to entertain. If that means working ostensibly within a genre, fine.