Life with most teenagers was like having a low-grade bladder infection. It hurts, but you had to tough it out.
Anne LamottRead
To be a good writer, you not only have to write a great deal but you have to care. You do not have to have a complicated moral philosophy. But a writer always tries, I think, to be a part of a solution, to understand a little about life and to pass this on.
Interpretation
What this quote means
A good writer combines creativity with genuine care for their work and the world.
Anne Lamott emphasizes that effective writing goes beyond sheer volume; it demands a heartfelt engagement with life and a desire to contribute positively to society. Writers should strive to convey their understanding of the human experience through their words, acting as conduits for deeper truths.
Themes
WritingCareHuman ExperienceSolutionLife
In practice
Example use cases
During a writing workshop, this quote could inspire participants to invest their emotions in their stories.
More from Anne Lamott
All quotes →Or you might shout at the top of your lungs or whisper into your sleeve, "I hate you, God." That is a prayer too, because it is real, it is truth, and maybe it is the first sincere thought you've had in months.
Anne LamottRead
Your problem is how you are going to spend this one odd and precious life you have been issued. Whether you're going to spend it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over people and circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it and find out the truth about who you are.
Anne LamottRead
It is hard to remember that you are a cherished spiritual being when you're burping up apple fritters and Cheetos.
Anne LamottRead
Gorgeous, amazing things come into our lives when we are paying attention: mangoes, grandnieces, Bach, ponds. This happens more often when we have as little expectation as possible. If you say, "Well, that's pretty much what I thought I'd see," you are in trouble. At that point you have to ask yourself why you are even here. [...] Astonishing material and revelation appear in our lives all the time. Let it be. Unto us, so much is given. We just have to be open for business.
Anne LamottRead
...because when people have seen you at their worst, you don't have to put on the mask as much.
Anne LamottRead
Similar quotes
Stories helped me unite parts of my existence that might otherwise have seemed irrevocably split by geography and time. And stories helped me find a future in which I, such a mongrel, could be comfortable.
Mohsin HamidRead
I hate outlines. I have a broad sense of where the story is going; I know the end, I know the end of the principal characters, and I know the major turning points and events from the books, the climaxes for each book, but I don't necessarily know each twist and turn along the way. That's something I discover in the course of writing and that's what makes writing enjoyable. I think if I outlined comprehensively and stuck to the outline the actual writing would be boring.
George R. R. MartinRead
When I started, I was an artist; I wanted to be an artist. I became an actor almost by accident. I acted for fifteen years and tried to produce. I looked for stories that were the story beneath the story that you thought you knew, like 'The Candidate'.
Robert RedfordRead
I should write for the mere yearning and fondness I have for the beautiful, even if my night's labors should be burnt every morning and no eye shine upon them.
John KeatsRead
I wake up in the morning and my mind starts making sentences, and I have to get rid of them fast - talk them or write them down.
Ernest HemingwayRead
Art, whose honesty must work through artifice, cannot avoid cheating truth.
Adrienne RichRead