I think of childhood as an explosion of creativity. For most people, growing up and earning a living means leaving all that behind. But an artist never leaves that behind. Edwin Mullhouse was my way of exploring the child as artist and, under the guise of childhood, something larger.
Interpretation
Childhood is a time of creativity that many abandon in adulthood, but artists retain that childlike imagination.
In this quote, Steven Millhauser reflects on the idea that childhood is a period rich with creativity and imagination, a vital part of an artist's identity. He suggests that while many people lose their creative instincts as they grow up and take on adult responsibilities, true artists manage to preserve that childhood essence in their work, allowing them to explore deeper themes and ideas through the lens of their imaginative beginnings.
In practice
During a creative workshop, I shared this quote to inspire participants to tap into their childhood creativity.
That afternoon he told me that the difference between human beings and animals was that human beings were able to dream while awake. He said the purpose of books was to permit us to exercise that faculty. Art, he said, was a controlled madness… He said books weren't made of themes, which you could write essays about, but of images that inserted themselves into your brain and replaced what you were seeing with your eyes.
Stories, like conjuring tricks, are invented because history is inadequate for our dreams.
The writer must believe that what he is doing is the most important thing in the world. And he must hold to this illusion even when he knows it is not true.
I realised I had spent the majority of my adult life doing two characters - Maude from 1972-'79 and Dorothy from 1985-'92 - and I really didn't know what I wanted to do after 'Golden Girls.' I knew what I didn't want to do - any more sitcoms, or wait for the next great role that might never come.
I had rescued the moment by using my camera and in that way had found how to stop time and hold it. No one could take that image away from me because I owned it.
Sometimes I wish that just solving the plot problems was enough. And then elves would go and do all the actual work moving the words around.
I have the words already. What I am seeking is the perfect order of words in the sentence. You can see for yourself how many different ways they might be arranged.
I come from a mixed family, where my mother is art house cinema and my father is B-movie genre cinema. They're estranged, and I've been trying to bring them together for all of my career to one degree or another.
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