Claire Messud Quotes
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You lose something in not being rooted, but you gain something by seeing the world differently. It's both a loss and a gift.
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I believe that, in an ideal world, writers would feel free to write what matters to them without having to consider success, failure, the market, etc.
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If I look at my make-up, Canada is a huge part of what I am.
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If you're rich, you can leave a library, a building, or a hospital wing. But writing leaves behind a visceral sense of what it was like to be alive on the planet in a particular time. Writing tells us what it meant for someone to be human.
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I'm a different person in French. I'm a different person in New York. I'm a different person in Canada.
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I'm not a writing group member, not a joiner in that way. I don't seek a wide swath of feedback.
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I wanted to write a voice that for me, as a reader, had been missing from the chorus: the voice of an angry woman.
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If you're writing a thriller, and you don't make it compelling, then you've really not done your job. So it's easier for me not to set out with certain goals, and then I can't see them as unmet. It's like life generally: If I'm not aiming to be physically fit, then I'm not always thinking about being unfit.
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Obstruction can be caused by so many factors - perfectionism, distraction, faltering confidence, external demands and pressures. At some point, of course, you've got to push through it all if you're to write, and if you don't, or can't, you're sunk.
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I wish I were a really good photographer.
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What is the truth? Is it what you experience? Is it what I experience? Or is there some objective truth in between?
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In a globalised world, so many of us move around so much. You lose things, but you also gain things - or hope to gain them.