Write. No amount of self-inflicted misery, altered states, black pullovers or being publicly obnoxious will ever add up to your being a writer. Writers write. On you go.
A.L. KennedyRead
Read. As much as you can. As deeply and widely and nourishingly and irritatingly as you can. And the good things will make you remember them, so you won't need to take notes.
Interpretation
Reading extensively and deeply enhances knowledge and memory.
A.L. Kennedy emphasizes the importance of reading not just for quantity but for the quality of engagement with the material. By immersing ourselves in a diverse range of texts, we can cultivate a deeper understanding and retention of knowledge, making note-taking obsolete for the truly impactful ideas that resonate with us the most.
In practice
In a classroom setting to inspire students to read more.
Write. No amount of self-inflicted misery, altered states, black pullovers or being publicly obnoxious will ever add up to your being a writer. Writers write. On you go.
You can look at the words on this paper and, because they are the ones I am used to choosing, they will show you the shape of me. I am here to be read in the way you might read the impression of my weight in a bed after a still night, a restless night, a night not alone.
Remember you love writing. It wouldn’t be worth it if you didn’t. If the love fades, do what you need to and get it back.
Books are the air I breathe, so I don't notice the seasons.
In an age in which infidelity abounds, do we observe parents carefully instructing their children in the principles of faith which they profess? Or do they furnish their children with arguments for the defense of that faith? ...it is not surprising to see them abandon a position which they are unable to defend.
Criticism starts - it has to start - with a real passion for reading. It can come in adolescence, even in your twenties, but you must fall in love with poems.
But with the library, it's like catnip, I suppose: you begin to run in circles because there's so much to look at and read.
We expect a great man to be a good reader.
Universities are not here to be mediums for the coercion of other people, they're here to be mediums for the free exchange of ideas.
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