Barnard Women Share Their Passion for The Writing Life
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AS SEEN AND HEARD AT... GREAT WRITERS AT BARNARD
What Makes a Writer
“Young writers sometimes think ‘inspiration’ is an angel with wings and long blonde hair who magically lands on your shoulder and makes everything happen; I find that inspiration comes when I’m already engaged in the act of writing, not before.”
“I have to trust that if the prose works for me, it will work for other people.”
“If you think about the audience when you’re writing for The New York Times, you will be paralyzed, because you’re writing for everyone from the man pulling the paper out of the garbage can in Central Park to the President and his administration in the White House.”
—Anna Quindlen ’74, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, bestselling author, and chair of the Barnard trustees |
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“The writer’s challenge is to find your own voice, something uniquely you. When it’s written in your own voice, there is nothing that has been said before.”
“When I write, I like to think of dead people that I really admire, and hope they will like it.”
“I still write longhand (having once lost 60 pages of a novel on the computer) and am fetishistic about my pens and notebooks.”
“Remember, writing and publishing are not synonymous. You can write anything, in fact, you must write anything.”
“As for whether you can teach writing, nobody questions whether it makes sense to take piano lessons or painting lessons. We can create a climate of nurturing and encouragement and make it a little quicker for people.”
“I know very few writers who can support themselves by their writing…and we now have oil companies running publishing companies.”
—Mary Gordon ’71, Chair, English Department and Millicent C. McIntosh Professor of Writing
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“Writing is such a solitary thing. You never know who you’re going to reach. Then there’s that moment of surprise at a reading, when someone calls you by a character’s name and you finally connect. I feel more grateful than powerful then.”
“I’m one of those ‘trance’ writers; it’s like I’m just the vessel, always trying to do whatever I can to bring about that altered state of creative consciousness.”
“You can claim other writers as your teachers through reading.”
—Edwidge Danticat ’90, National Book Award finalist, Krik? Krak!
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“Writing felt like such a bold thing to do, I was almost afraid to even try.”
“I don’t think of my writing as Indian writing, just like growing up I didn’t think of what we ate as Indian food – it was just what we ate.”
—Jhumpa Lahiri ’89, Pulitzer Prize winning author, Interpreter of Maladies
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“I have trouble identifying myself as a Writer – the godlike figure who arranges things on the page; instead, I’ve always identified with the character in the story.”
“People sometimes mistake brutal honesty for quality.”
“I do my best writing in the library on my laptop; no one can call me there and I’m not supposed to eat anything.”
—Ann Brashares ’89, author, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series |
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Photos by Diane Bondareff |
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