Like the collector, the photographer is animated by a passion that, even when it appears to be for the present, is linked to a sense of the past.
Susan SontagRead
Volume depends precisely on the writer's having been able to sit in a room every day, year after year, alone.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Volume refers to the body of work produced by a writer, which comes from dedicated solitude and consistent effort.
In this quote, Susan Sontag emphasizes the importance of solitude and discipline in the writing process. She suggests that the quantity and quality of a writer's work depend on their commitment to spending time alone, honing their craft without distractions, which ultimately leads to greater creative output over the years.
Themes
WritingSolitudeDisciplineCreativityDedication
In practice
Example use cases
Use this quote in a writing workshop to inspire aspiring authors to embrace solitude.
More from Susan Sontag
All quotes βScience fiction films are not about science. They are about disaster, which is one of the oldest subjects of art.
Susan SontagRead
Gide and I have attained such perfect intellectual communion that I experience the appropriate labor pains for every thought he gives birth to!
Susan SontagRead
In NY sensuality completely turns into sexuality - no objects for the senses to respond to, no beautiful river, houses, people. Awful smells of the street, and dirt... Nothing except eating, if that, and the frenzy of the bed.
Susan SontagRead
It hurts to love. It's like giving yourself to be flayed and knowing that at any moment the other person may just walk off with your skin.
Susan SontagRead
Conventions vs. spontaneity. This is a dialectical choice, it depends on the assessment you make of your own times. If you judge that your own time is ridden with empty insincere formalities, you plump for spontaneity, for indecorous behavior even...Much of morality is the task of compensating for one's age. One assumes unfashionable virtues, in an indecorous time. In a time hollowed out by decorum, one must school oneself in spontaneity.
Susan SontagRead
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My own physicality, not an abstract idea, makes me a choreographer.
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