Quotessence
Home / Authors / Mary Gaitskill
Mary Gaitskill

Mary Gaitskill Quotes

Author

Filter quotes by topic

AllThinkingPeopleIfsKindSometimesWritingBeautifulChildrenDifferentFeelsSaidSpiritTryingWantWayAdulteryAgeAliveBlackBook

Famous Mary Gaitskill Quotes

“I think the closest thing I can come to defining what that vital thing is for me - is that there's a sort of soul-quality in writing, if it's any good. It has a spirit or an energy to it that is very integral to who the writer is on a deep level. It's almost a cellular thing. It takes place in the cells of the writing, and it is what makes it alive or not.”

IfsThinkingWritingI CanSoulSpiritEnergyLevelsQualityAliveCellsClosestDefiningCellular
Author:Mary Gaitskill
Create image

“Writing is.... being able to take something whole and fiercely alive that exists inside you in some unknowable combination of thought, feeling, physicality, and spirit, and to then store it like a genie in tense, tiny black symbols on a calm white page. If the wrong reader comes across the words, they will remain just words. But for the right readers, your vision blooms off the page and is absorbed into their minds like smoke, where it will re-form, whole and alive, fully adapted to its new environment.”

IfsWritingMindWholeFeelingsAbleFormSpiritBlackWhiteVisionEnvironmentAliveReaderPagesCalmStoresTinySymbolsSmokeCombinationTenseAdaptedPhysicalityGeniesNew Environment
Author:Mary Gaitskill
Create image