Ben Okri Quotes
Reading, like writing, is a creative act. If readers only bring a narrow range of themselves to the book, then they'll only see their narrow range reflected in it.
Quotes to Explore
-
Writing about the future and the past is less a way of dramatizing change than of showing, by way of contrast, what abides.
-
I've got plenty of quirks. I go to an office early in the morning. Early in the morning is really good writing time. I take anywhere between six to eight showers a day. I'm not exaggerating. I'm not a germaphobe: it's all about a fresh start.
-
I haven't found it to be particularly enjoyable... ninety percent of the time when I go on dates, I'm thinking, 'I could be reading my book instead.'
-
One half who graduate from college never read another book.
-
The strongest results were in Florida and Texas. In just one year in a Texas charter school, an average student gained 7 percentile points in math and 8 percentile points in reading, while Florida charter schools improved student performance by 6 percentile points.
-
Well, I must tell you I write the scripts very close to the bone. So I'm writing episode seven now and couldn't tell you what happens in episode eight.
-
Every book I write, the media just keeps punching me in the face.
-
Normally, most writers don't say, 'I'm going into a mild hypnotic trance.' Typically, they don't know how they do it. Most people, when they have a good experience writing, they're well placed in that state, which is also sometimes called a 'flow state.' If you don't have trouble, you don't have to think about it.
-
I like to believe, as a writer, that anybody who isn't a reader yet has just not found the right book.
-
Now I'm an old Christmas tree, the roots of which have died. They just come along and while the little needles fall off me replace them with medallions.
-
I was always more interested in my books and my writing than going out. It's OK to say I'm a nerd. That's me.
-
I am a great procrastinator. When the writing is going really well, the laundry piles up.
-
Writing is a creative process, and you need to have the doors and windows of your mind open so that you have the possibility of change.
-
Education... has produced a vast population able to read but unable to distinguish what is worth reading.
-
From 1999 on - until 2003 - I covered publishing in a weekly column for Wired.com and wrote for several other publications - altogether writing over 150 articles.
-
The greatest pleasure of reading consists in re-reading.
-
Whether you want to entertain or to provoke, to break hearts or reassure them, what you bring to your writing must consist of your longings and disappointments.
-
A book tour is not a good opportunity to let your mind wander. You have to pay attention, remember salespeople's and interviewers' names, succinctly summarize your book in a 'selling' way, and so on.
-
I always loved writing, be it creative writing for school or just poetry. I just loved writing, and in college, I started really trying to write songs and was copying other artists, just to figure it out - but I think freshman year of high school is when I realized, 'I want to be a writer. I have something to say.'
-
You're writing about young, vibrant people; there are wins and losses. In other words, it's great drama.
-
Well, I used to have a sister, but I never got to meet her because she died after two days, I think. So if I got a tattoo, it would probably have to be something to do with my sister. I actually want to get a tattoo when I'm older of something about her.
-
A little allegory of the soul - wherever it hides, God will find it.
-
I have a very small public.
-
Reading, like writing, is a creative act. If readers only bring a narrow range of themselves to the book, then they'll only see their narrow range reflected in it.
