A Quote by Ron Carlson
I always write about my own experiences, whether I've had them or not.
Related Quotes
It's easier to write from my own life, and it's also more fun. I always write about relationships, for instance, whether they're romantic relationships, friendships, encounters... there's always a lesson to be learned from them.
Whether you are aware of them or not, whether you recognize them as spiritual or not, you probably have had the experiences of silence, or transcendence, or the Divine-a few seconds, a few minutes that seem out of time; a moment when the ordinary looks beautiful, glowing; a deep sense of being at peace, feeling happy for no reason. When these experiences come...believe in them. They reflect your true nature.
Somehow, I realized I could write books about black characters who reflected my own experiences or otherworldly experiences - not just stories of history, poverty and oppression.
The 'phenomenal concept' issue is rather different, I think. Here the question is whether there are concepts of experiences that are made available to subjects solely in virtue of their having had those experiences themselves. Is there a way of thinking about seeing something red, say, that you get from having had those experiences, and so isn't available to a blind person?
I write about kids growing up, I write a lot about schools and parents, and all of my experiences with those things have been suburban experiences.
Whenever I write about motherhood - and I write about it a lot - I am drawing on my experiences as a mother and also my experiences as a daughter.
I write with experiences in mind, but I don't write about them, I write out of them.
We can't give the truth to someone as an object, we can only point to it, inviting inspection. It is in that spirit that we can hear or read a teaching and then look at our own lives, at our own experiences to see whether anything might have been revealed about them.
I talk to our kids now that they are grown up, and I ask them about the experiences that had growing up that really had a powerful influence on the way they view the purpose of life. The experiences that really shaped their values - my wife and I have no memory of those experiences!
'Matisse and Picasso' is a little like Plato after Socrates. Socrates only taught in words. He didn't write. And after that, you had Plato and Aristotle to write about what he had said. I write about them because they didn't write about them.
I got letters from people that have had peculiar psychic experiences, experiences with the dead - sometimes fairly tranquil experiences and sometimes very terrifying experiences. I do believe that a lot of them are sincere. I do believe, also, that some of them may be misguided. But, I think the majority of them have experienced something.
It's easier to write about heartbreak after you've had your heart broken. You have more material to draw from, you can extrapolate from your own experiences and make reasonable assumptions about how your characters would feel and act.
To try and imagine that I'm another person is always going to be hard - whether I'm writing about a truck driver or someone who is gay, who's trans, who is of a different ethnicity or creed. But it would be boring if I always had to write about myself and my limited viewpoint.
I'm always inspired to write, and it's usually my own life experiences that inspire me.
What Grandfather Burton did for me was to write a sacred family record, the small plates of Burton, or, if you will, an inspirational family record. Much of what we now regard as scripture was not anything more or less than men writing of their own spiritual experiences for the benefit of their posterity. These scriptures are family records. Therefore, as a people we ought to write of our own lives and our own experiences to form a sacred record for our descendants. We must provide for them the same uplifting, faith-promoting strength that the ancient scriptures now give us.
I do not think writers ought ever to sit down and think they must write about some cause, or theme, or something. If they write about their own experiences, something true is going to emerge.
Related Authors
Charles Bukowski Quotes
American
Novelist
Charles Dickens Quotes
English
Novelist
Chuck Palahniuk Quotes
American
Novelist
Ernest Hemingway Quotes
American
Novelist
George Eliot Quotes
British
Novelist
George Orwell Quotes
British
Novelist
George R. R. Martin Quotes
American
Novelist
Jane Austen Quotes
British
Novelist
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
German
Novelist
Margaret Atwood Quotes
Canadian
Novelist
Nicholas Sparks Quotes
American
Novelist
Paulo Coelho Quotes
Brazilian
Novelist
Sarah Dessen Quotes
American
Novelist
Stephenie Meyer Quotes
American
Novelist
Veronica Roth Quotes
American
Novelist
Victor Hugo Quotes
French
Novelist