I started to write as a child as soon as I could read, or even before, when my mother read me Beatrix Potter at bedtime. Writing seemed to me to be the only sensible way to live and be happy.
Interpretation
Writing offers a path to happiness and fulfillment stemming from early inspirations.
In this quote, Jane Gardam reflects on her childhood experience with stories read by her mother, which ignited her passion for writing. She conveys that writing became her chosen way to express herself and find joy, suggesting that creative pursuits rooted in early influences can profoundly shape one's happiness and life choices.
In practice
Using this quote to inspire students in a creative writing class.
Stories of all lengths and depths come from different parts of the cave. For a novel, you must lay in mental, physical and spiritual provision as for a siege or for a time of hectic explosions, while a short story is, or can be, a steady, timed flame like the lighting of a blow lamp on a building site full of dry tinder.
I discovered that writing was very nice indeed when I was very young, and I never changed. I don't think my style has changed very much at all - though I hope what I say is a bit more interesting. It's about getting to know a character and loving them, I think.
I was nearly 40 when I started. I had no fear that I wasn't going to write. I knew it was just delayed. Then, my goodness, I never stopped.
In modern novels, there is no one I want to copy. My style 'is a poor thing, but it is my own.'
Some of the most intense affairs are between actors and characters. There's a fire in the human heart and we jump into it with the same obsession as we have with our lovers.
Hip-hop is the streets. Hip-hop is a couple of elements that it comes from back in the days... that feel of music with urgency that speaks to you. It speaks to your livelihood and it's not compromised. It's blunt. It's raw, straight off the street - from the beat to the voice to the words.
The experience of writing 'The Kite Runner' is one I will always think back on with fondness. There is an energy, a romance in writing the first novel that can never be duplicated again.
Any work of architecture that has with it some discussion, some polemic, I think is good. It shows that people are interested, people are involved.
People like Dick Gregory, Paul Robeson, Harry Belafonte and Nina Simone show me what the definition of an artist is - it isn't just to make art but to speak truth to what's happening, speak beauty into the world, speak love into the world and also... get involved.
With me poetry has not been a purpose, but a passion.
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