If you have the guts to be yourself, other people'll pay your price.
John UpdikeRead
I seem most instinctively to believe in the human value of creative writing, whether in the form of verse or fiction, as a mode of truth-telling, self-expression and homage to the twin miracles of creation and consciousness.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Creative writing serves as a powerful tool for self-expression and revealing truths about humanity.
In this quote, John Updike emphasizes the significance of creative writing, whether as poetry or narrative fiction, in illustrating the intrinsic value of human experience. He suggests that through this form of artistic expression, individuals can convey truths and reflect their consciousness, celebrating the dual wonders of creativity and awareness.
Themes
Creative WritingSelf-ExpressionTruthConsciousnessArt
In practice
Example use cases
Quotes about the importance of writing can inspire students in a creative writing class.
More from John Updike
All quotes →Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that's the stuff life is made of. _x000D_ _x000D_ Suspect each moment, for it is a thief, tiptoeing away with more than it brings.
John UpdikeRead
Museums and bookstores should feel, I think, like vacant lots - places where the demands on us are our own demands, where the spirit can find exercise in unsupervised play.
John UpdikeRead
But it is just two lovers, holding hands and in a hurry to reach their car, their locked hands a starfish leaping through the dark.
John UpdikeRead
The reader knows the writer better than he knows himself; but the writer's physical presence is light from a star that has moved on.
John UpdikeRead
To guarantee the individual maximum freedom within a social frame of minimal laws ensures - if not happiness - its hopeful pursuit.
John UpdikeRead
Similar quotes
The best thing about writing has been the writer's life, the sense of being expressed, the ownership of the day, the entirely specious sense of freedom we have, however slave we are to some boss or other. I wouldn't trade it for any other life.
Anthony MinghellaRead
A film is a terrible thing to waste.
Roger EbertRead
Many great writers have been extraordinarily awkward in daily exchange, but the greatest give the impression that their style was nursed by the closest attention to colloquial speech.
Thornton WilderRead
The world concerns me only in so far as I have a certain debt and duty to it, because I have lived in it for thirty years and owe to it to leave behind some souvenir in the shape of drawings and paintings – not done to please any particular movement, but within which a genuine human sentiment is expressed.
Vincent Van GoghRead
I have never thought of writing for reputation and honor. What I have in my heart must come out; that is the reason why I compose.
Ludwig Van BeethovenRead
Metaphor is not just the detection of patterns; it is the creation of patterns.
James GearyRead