My reaction to porno films is as follows: After the first ten minutes, I want to go home and screw. After the first twenty minutes, I never want to screw again as long as I live.
Erica JongRead
I went for years not finishing anything. Because, of course, when you finish something you can be judged...I had poems which were re-written so many times I suspect it was just a way of avoiding sending them out.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Fear of judgment can hinder creativity and prevent completion of work.
This quote by Erica Jong reflects on the struggle many creatives face with completing their projects due to the fear of judgment. It highlights the tendency to overwork and revise one's creations as a means of procrastination, illustrating how this cycle can ultimately hinder one from sharing their work with the world.
Themes
FearCreativityJudgmentProcrastinationWriting
In practice
Example use cases
During a creative writing workshop to encourage participants to share their stories.
More from Erica Jong
All quotes →I have accepted fear as a part of life - specifically the fear of change... I have gone ahead despite the pounding in the heart that says: turn back.
Erica JongRead
No one ever found wisdom without also being a fool. Writers, alas, have to be fools in public, while the rest of the human race can cover its tracks.
Erica JongRead
My generation was not only maligned in book reviews and attacked in graduate school but we lived to see our adored and adorable daughters wonder why feminism had become a dirty word.
Erica JongRead
Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.
Erica JongRead
I believe that women should live for love, for motherhood and for intellect, and I believe we shouldn't have to choose. And I believe that's always been difficult for women, to express themselves intellectually, maternally, and passionately.
Erica JongRead
Similar quotes
Man, being made reasonable, and so a thinking creature, there is nothing more worthy of his being than the right direction and employment of his thoughts; since upon this depends both his usefulness to the public, and his own present and future benefit in all respects.
William PennRead
What I fear and desire most in this world is passion. I fear it because it promises to be spontaneous, out of my control, unnamed, beyond my reasonable self. I desire it because passion has color, like the landscape before me. It is not pale. It is not neutral. It reveals the backside of the heart.
Terry Tempest WilliamsRead
I have tried to be a man of letters in love with ideas in order to be a wiser and more loving person, hoping to leave the world just a little better than I found it.
Cornel WestRead
I've had the good fortune of teaching and preaching across much of the globe, while also struggling to make sense of my experience in my own tiny world.
Richard RohrRead
There are many things which we can afford to forget which it is yet well to learn.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.Read
There is no limit to the ingenuity of man if it is properly and vigorously applied under conditions of peace and justice.
Winston ChurchillRead