When you write from your gut and let the stuff stay flawed and don't let anybody tell you to make it better, it can end up looking like nothing else.
Interpretation
Writing authentically allows for unique expression, even if it's imperfect.
This quote emphasizes the importance of writing authentically and embracing imperfections. Louis C. K. suggests that when individuals write from their true feelings and instincts, without fear of criticism or the pressure to conform, their work can emerge as something truly one-of-a-kind and genuine, as opposed to something that is merely polished and conventional.
In practice
This quote can be used during a creative writing workshop to encourage participants to embrace their unique voice.
I just always loved comedy and I really wanted to be good at it. And it was heartbreaking, 'cause I started and I wasn't good at it. I was only 17-years-old, so I had a lot to learn about life in general. But I just kept on trying. I was young enough and stupid enough and I had no other choice. I had nothing else I was good at.
It's a positive thing to talk about terrible things and make people laugh about them.
[about being a father] I don't really remember what it was like before. Whatever I had going on, it was bullshit. It wasn't important. It's kind of a nice thing about being a dad. My identity is really about them now, and what I can do for them, so it sort of takes the pressure off of your own life. What am I going to do, who am I? Who cares, you've got to get your kids to school. So I like it that way.
The only time you should look in your neighbor's bowl is to make sure that they have enough. You don't look in your neighbor's bowl to see if you have as much as them.
In 27 years doing this, I've seen a handful of truly great, masterful standup sets. One was Tig Notaro last night at Largo.
People come back from flights and tell you a story like it's a horror story. That's how bad they make it sound. They're like, 'It was the worst day of my life. We didn't board for 20 minutes and they made us sit there on the runway for 40 minutes.' Oh really? What happened next? Did you fly in the air, incredibly, like a bird? Did you partake in the miracle of human flight you non-contributing zero?'
We live entirely, especially if we are writers, by the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images.
If it adapts itself to what the majority of our society wants, art will be a meaningless recreation.
Writing, the art of communicating thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the great invention of the world.
So many new things have been discovered in the 20th century that now, at the end of the century, we need some kind of synthesis, some musical language which will allow us just to write music.
You know, people speak in poetry all the time. They just don't realize it.
If the world were clear, art would not exist.
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