Kate DiCamillo Quotes About Writing

Quotes about: Writing

• It is truly excellent to have someone believe in you and your ability to write. But I think it is just as helpful to have people who don't believe in you, people who mock you, people who doubt you, people who enrage you. Fortunately, there is never a shortage of this type of person in the world ... write for yourself. Write for the story. And write, also, for all of the people who doubt you. Write for all those people who are not brave enough to do this grand and wondrous thing themselves. Let them motivate you.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Believe, Writing, Thinking

• Hands down, the biggest thrill is to get a letter from a kid saying, I loved your book. Will you write me another one?

  Kate DiCamillo

  Book, Kids, Writing

• Every well-written book is a light for me. When you write, you use other writers and their books as guides in the wilderness.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Book, Writing, Light

• We [me and Alison McGhee] probably wouldn't have said that when we were writing the stories, but it is so apparent to me in the finished product. For me, looking at Bink, it's like looking at myself on the page in a way that I've never experienced with any other book that I've written.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Book, Writing, Stories

  "Q & A with Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee". Interview with Claire Kirch, www.teachingbooks.net. September 9, 2010.

• The words, "I have a dog named Winn-Dixie," popped into my head in the voice of a small girl with a southern accent. I'd been writing long enough at that point to know not to ignore that kind of red flag. The next day, I put aside what I'd been working on, started with that one sentence, and followed it all the way to the end.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Girl, Dog, Writing

  Source: www.teachingbooks.net

• It is always just telling a story, regardless of the age of the reader. Except, if I'm writing something for kids, I know there has to be hope. I don't necessarily feel that responsibility for adults, but I emphatically feel it for children. That's the only difference. There's no syntax difference. There's no semantics difference. There's no thematic difference.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Children, Kids, Responsibility

  Source: www.teachingbooks.net

• If I am just home and writing, I become very strange.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Home, Writing, Strange

  Source: www.hbook.com

• I was born in Philadelphia and currently live in Minneapolis. I write for both children and adults.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Children, Writing, Philadelphia

• While we were working, we were writing about a tall girl and a short girl, which we thought was funny, because Alison's [McGhee] tall and I'm short.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Girl, Writing, Tall

  "Q & A with Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee". Interview with Claire Kirch, www.publishersweekly.com. September 9, 2010.

• The Tale of Despereaux came at the request of Luke, my friend's then-eight-year-old son, who asked, "Write for me the story of an unlikely hero with exceptionally large ears."

  Kate DiCamillo

  Hero, Writing, Son

  TeachingBooks.net Interview, www.teachingbooks.net. November 12, 2005.

• A typical day for me is I get up at 6:00, the coffeemaker goes on automatically and the computer gets turned on. I pour a cup of coffee, listen to Garrison Keillor's The Writer's Almanac, and then I write.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Coffee, Writing, Typical

  TeachingBooks.net Interview, www.teachingbooks.net. November 12, 2005.

• I need to write, and I can't write when I'm on the road.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Needs, I Can

  Source: www.hbook.com

• My goal is two pages a day, five days a week. I never want to write, but I'm always glad that I have done it. After I write, I go to work at the bookstore.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Two, Goal

• I was over at Alison's [McGhee], I think we were playing Scrabble. I remember we were both complaining - yeah, we sound like whiners - about how hard writing is, and how we didn't have a story to work on. Alison said, 'Why don't we work on writing something together,' and I said, 'Eh, I don't know if I could work that way.' She said, 'Well, just show up here and we'll see,' and I said, 'Well, what would it be about?' She said, 'Duh, it'd be about a tall girl and a short girl.' So I agreed to come and try it for a day.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Girl, Writing, Thinking

  "Q & A with Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee". Interview with Claire Kirch, www.teachingbooks.net. September 9, 2010.

• I didn't know at the time I was writing Because of Winn-Dixie where the story came from, but in retrospect I can see that it was a response to a terribly harsh winter here in Minnesota.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Winter, Dixie

  TeachingBooks.net Interview, www.teachingbooks.net. November 12, 2005.

• I write two pages - that's all I write. It takes me about an hour. I've learned that's all I'm capable of and to push myself beyond that is foolhardy. It's a very delicate thing, and I will not abuse it. So I write two pages, then I get up from the computer.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Delicate Things, Two

  Source: www.teachingbooks.net

• This is the great thing about writing for kids. Adults might not do anything if they recognized me. But if they do see me, and they're with a kid, they'll tell the kid who I am. They think they should give that to the kid. So generally that sends the kid over.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Kids, Thinking

  Source: www.hbook.com

• I work full-time in a used bookstore. I get up. I drink a cup of coffee. I think, The last thing I want to do is write. Then I go to the computer and write.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Coffee, Writing, Thinking

• Understand, I had absolutely no interest in writing; I wanted to be a Writer.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Interest, Wanted

• We were 15 minutes into it and nothing was happening; I thought, well, that's not going to work. Then all of a sudden everything clicked. I don't know how long it took us, but I would just show up at Alison's [McGhee] office. She would type and we'd just kick it back and forth. Writing is so scary for me, such a lonely endeavor, and it became a wonderful thing to show up and have somebody else go through it with me. It was actually a wonderful experience.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Lonely, Writing, Long

  "Q & A with Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee". Interview with Claire Kirch, www.publishersweekly.com. September 9, 2010.

• I was visiting my mother in Florida when the September 11, 2001 attacks happened. I was working on The Tale of Despereaux at that point. I had already gone into writing it with a great deal of trepidation and fear, and then this God-awful thing happens and it was really hard to even get back home to Minneapolis.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Mother, Home, Writing

  TeachingBooks.net Interview, www.teachingbooks.net. November 12, 2005.

• I journal for about half an hour, and by the time that's done, the business day on the East Coast has begun. The phone starts to ring, and the rest of the day is spent dealing with the business of writing. My workday is done at about 3:00.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Phones, East

  Source: www.teachingbooks.net

• I always write with music. It takes me a while to figure out the right piece of music for what I'm working on. Once I figure it out, that's the only thing I'll play.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Play, Pieces

• I've never worked with a co-author before [Alison McGhee]. Writing for me is a pretty scary thing, so it was a huge comfort to have someone in the room working with me. It became less like work and more like play.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Writing, Play, Scary

  Interview with Eliza Borné, bookpage.com. September 2010.

• One, we [with Alison McGhee] laugh a lot - that was great. Two, I enjoy writing, but it's a lonely undertaking. To have someone in the room with me is an absolute delight and makes it seem less impossible. It became a kind of comforting, joyful process.

  Kate DiCamillo

  Lonely, Writing, Two

  "Q & A with Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee". Interview with Claire Kirch, www.teachingbooks.net. September 9, 2010.

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