When you're all alone out there, on the end of the typewriter, with each new story a new appraisal by the world of whether you can still get it up or not, arrogance and self-esteem and deep breathing are all you have. It often looks like egomania. I assure you it's the bold coverup of the absolutely terrified.
Interpretation
This quote reflects the inner struggles of a writer facing the judgment of their work, emphasizing the balance between confidence and fear.
Harlan Ellison's quote encapsulates the dichotomy faced by writers, particularly in moments of solitude and vulnerability when confronting the opinions of the world. It suggests that the bravado often displayed by creatives can mask deeper insecurities and fears of inadequacy, revealing the complex emotional landscape that lies beneath outward confidence. Through the lens of a typewriter, he symbolizes the struggle for validation and the courage it takes to face criticism while creating art.
In practice
In a motivational speech about facing challenges in creative fields, one could use this quote to illustrate the importance of inner strength.
People on the outside think there's something magical about writing, that you go up in the attic at midnight and cast the bones and come down in the morning with a story, but it isn't like that. You sit in back of the typewriter and you work, and that's all there is to it.
The more you know, the more unflinchingly you deny casual beliefs and Accepted Wisdom when it flies in the face of reality, the more carefully you observe the world and its people around you, the better chance you have of writing something meaningful and well-crafted.
I think [religion] is presumptuous and I think it is silly, because it makes you believe that you are less than what you can be. As long as you can blame everything on some unseen deity, you don’t ever have to be responsible for your own behavior.
Writing is the hardest work in the world. I have been a bricklayer and a truck driver, and I tell you – as if you haven't been told a million times already – that writing is harder. Lonelier. And nobler and more enriching.
The trap into which all writers have, will, or should fall into, of writing The Great American Watchamacallit, is such an uncluttered and inviting one that from time to time I'm sure even the greatest have to pull themselves up short by the Shift key to remind themselves that it is story first that they should write.
I know that pain is the most important thing in the universes. Greater than survival, greater than love, greater even than the beauty it brings about. For without pain, there can be no pleasure. Without sadness, there can be no happiness. Without misery there can be no beauty. And without these, life is endless, hopeless, doomed and damned. Adult. You have become adult.
Some people hear their own inner voices with great clearness. And they live by what they hear. Such people become crazy... or they become legend.
We must make automatic and habitual, as early as possible, as many useful actions as we can, and as carefully guard against the growing into ways that are likely to be disadvantageous.
There are two ways of exerting one's strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.
The easiest thing to do on earth is not write.
When you are older you will understand how precious little things, seemingly of no value in themselves, can be loved and prized above all price when they convey the love and thoughtfulness of a good heart.
To me, it's obvious that the winner has to bet very selectively. It's been obvious to me since very early in life. I don't know why it's not obvious to very many other people.
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