If you're a kid who is always on the outside hoping to be on the inside, you're watching a lot. You're trying to figure out how to become a normal person in a society that considers you weird.
Katherine PatersonRead
I love revisions...We can't go back and revise our lives, but being allowed to go back and revise what we have written comes closest.
Interpretation
What this quote means
We can't change our past experiences, but we can improve our current creations through revisions.
Katherine Paterson reflects on the idea that while we cannot alter our past actions or choices in life, the act of revising our written works allows us a semblance of control over our creative expression. Revisions serve as a metaphor for reflection and growth, suggesting that through careful reconsideration, one can enhance and refine both their writing and their understanding of life's complexities.
Themes
RevisionGrowthWritingReflectionLife
In practice
Example use cases
In a writing workshop, to encourage participants to embrace feedback.
More from Katherine Paterson
All quotes βIt's such a thrill when an adult comes up to me and says, 'I read your book as a child and really loved it.' That's a tremendous compliment.
Katherine PatersonRead
She had tricked him. She had made him leave his old self behind and come into her world, and then before he was really at home in it but too late to go back, she had left him stranded there--like an astronaut wandering about on the moon. Alone.
Katherine PatersonRead
Children have to have access to books, and a lot of children can't go to a store and buy a book. We need not only our public libraries to be funded properly and staffed properly, but our school libraries. Many children can't get to a public library, and the only library they have is a school library.
Katherine PatersonRead
We are trying to communicate that which lies in our deepest heart, which has no words, which can only be hinted at through the means of a story. And somehow, miraculously, a story that comes from deep in my heart calls from a reader that which is deepest in his or her heart, and together from our secret hidden selves we create a story that neither of us could have told alone.
Katherine PatersonRead
The challenge for those of us who care about our faith and about a hurting world is to tell stories which will carry the words of grace and hope in their bones and sinews and not wear them like fancy dress.
Katherine PatersonRead
Similar quotes
Part of resilience is deciding to make yourself miserable over something that matters, or deciding to make yourself miserable over something that doesn't matter.
Elizabeth EdwardsRead
Your mind must become one, do not try to understand with your ears but with your heart. Indeed, not with your heart but with your soul.
ZhuangziRead
No one has lived a short life who has performed its duties with unblemished character.
Marcus Tullius CiceroRead
One should follow a man of wisdom who rebukes one for one's faults, as one would follow a guide to some buried treasure. To one who follows such a wise man, it will be an advantage and not a disadvantage.
Gautama BuddhaRead
You must train your intuition - you must trust the small voice inside you which tells you exactly what to say, what to decide.
Ingrid BergmanRead
What we spend our time on is probably the most important decision we make.
Ray KurzweilRead