A Quote by Poppy Z. Brite

I've certainly learned a great deal from my husband, though, and could never have written a book like Liquor without him and the people he introduces me to and the stories he brings home.
Books written out of fire give me a great deal of pleasure. You get the sense that the world for these writers could not have continued if the book hadn't been written. When you come across a book like that it is a privilege.
Even though I read voraciously as a child, I never saw myself in books. Without narratives to expand my ideas of who I could be, I accepted the stories others told me about myself, stories which diminished and belittled me and people like me. I want to write against that.
To be able to make up stories has been a great gift to me from my ancestors and from the storytellers who were so numerous at Laguna Pueblo when I was growing up. I learned to read as soon as I could because I wanted stories without having to depend on adults to tell or read stories to me.
My mother lived her life through movies and books - she read everything there was to read. And she read to me every night. I never went to sleep without her reading to me. And she fantasized about the book and she would talk about it, the place, and you would think that after she read the book and after she told you stories about it, that she had actually been there. I learned about story from her, and I learned the value of a great story, and the value of great characters.
The Buddhists say there are 149 ways to God. I'm not looking for God, only for myself, and that is far more complicated. God has had a great deal written about Him; nothing has been written about me. God is bigger, like my mother, easier to find, even in the dark. I could be anywhere, and since I can't describe myself I can't ask for help.
Some of my youthful readers are developing wonderful imaginations. This pleases me. When I was young I longed to write a great novel that should win me fame. Now that I am getting old my first book is written to amuse children. For aside from my evident inability to do anything "great," I have learned to regard fame as a will-o-the-wisp which, when caught, is not worth the possession; but to please a child is a sweet and lovely thing that warms one's heart and brings its own reward.
I never was a crazy liquor drinker, and I don't like beer that much - though I keep the brews at home because my homies love beer.
I've never really found inspiration for story ideas in the news, but I'd say it certainly affects our lives in so many ways. I would say that certainly the stories of the day appear in the work - I just have never gone so far as to say, well, this particular event could influence a plot of an entire book.
If, like Harry Keogh, I could talk to the dead - God, there are an awful lot of people I would like to speak to! Not least my father. Being in the army for 22 years, I didn't see enough of him, and I know there are a great many things I could have learned from him.
I've never written about a situation involving real people that I haven't directly taken part in. I've never made things up about other people. None of my stories were written with ill-intent towards the other people in them, even though I doubt people will believe that about "Adrien Brody."
I know people who have suffered writer's block, and I don't think I've ever had it. A friend of mine, for three years he couldn't write. And he said that he thought of stories and he knew the stories, could see the stories completely, but he could never find the door. Somehow that first sentence was never there. And without the door, he couldn't do the story. I've never experienced that. But it's a chilling thought.
If, like Harry Keogh, I could talk to the dead - God, there are an awful lot of people I would like to speak to! Not least my father. Being in the army for 22 years, I didnt see enough of him, and I know there are a great many things I could have learned from him.
People do sometimes ask me some really idiotic questions: 'Is your husband afraid of you putting arsenic in his food?' I replied that I have never written a book about poison, ever.
What I like best is a book that's at least funny once in a while. What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn't happen much, though.
We [me and Alison McGhee] probably wouldn't have said that when we were writing the stories, but it is so apparent to me in the finished product. For me, looking at Bink, it's like looking at myself on the page in a way that I've never experienced with any other book that I've written.
I don't feel I'm angry. I feel as though I'm describing something true. If I had stabbed my husband, I could understand being called "angry." If I had an affair with my husband's best friend and written about that experience, I could see the anger. But I'm not doing that.
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