As a writer of fiction, I spend my days inventing real lives for make-believe people; what I create can only seem real.
I write because I'm in love with language; because I like working for myself, inside my head; and because it's the only way I know to make a stab at answering the never-ending questions of the heart that arise simply from the everyday living of our lives.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Writing is a passionate engagement with language that helps explore and answer life's profound questions.
In this quote, Julia Glass expresses her deep love for language and writing as a means to navigate the complexities of human emotion and experience. She suggests that writing is not only a personal endeavor that allows her to work independently and introspectively, but also a way to confront the endless inquiries and feelings that life presents us with daily. This highlights the transformative power of writing as both an art form and a tool for understanding oneself and the heart's desires.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a creative writing workshop, I shared this quote to inspire participants to embrace their love for language.
More from Julia Glass
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Photographs don’t lie, but liars may photograph
How many of the original songs survive intact from the slave cabins? Probably not many in their original form. Time has transformed them like light in a prism. What we hope to present is a version of those spirituals, and they speak not just to black Americans, but to people worldwide.
I like to look at pictures, all kinds. And all those things you absorb come out subconsciously one way or another. You'll be taking photographs and suddenly know that you have resources from having looked at a lot of them before. There is no way you can avoid this. But this kind of subconscious influence is good, and it certainly can work for one. In fact, the more pictures you see, the better you are as a photographer.
Everyone who gave me food, who took away my hunger, inspired me to compose. They told me their stories, and I had no other way to console them than with a piece of music, and that is how I learned. I did not resolve their problems with my songs, but I created a moment of release.
What we [writers] do might be done in solitude and with great desperation, but it tends to produce exactly the opposite. It tends to produce community and in many people hope and joy.
To disappear your complete self into a character is quite difficult. I've tried it 85 times, and I've succeeded two or three times.