Ali Smith

Ali Smith
Ali Smith CBE FRSLis a Scottish writer...
NationalityScottish
ProfessionWriter
important stories knows
It is important to know the stories and histories of things, even if all we know is that we don't know.
years knowing important
We all know our dates of birth but . . . every year there is another date that we pass over without knowing what it is but it is just as important it is the other date the death date.
important world stuff
The whole point is, we can forget. It’s important that we forget some things. Otherwise we’d go round the world carrying a hodload of stuff we just don’t need.
clothes long important
I have thought for a long time that the way my clothes hang on me is more important than me inside them.
art craft crafty dark great light notions quite time twin word
It's the word 'artful'; it's such a great word, with its dark and its light side, its art and its cunning, the craft and the crafty of it - I've been preoccupied with the word 'artful' and the twin notions of 'cornucopia' and 'pickpocket' it suggests for quite some time.
looks kind
There is a kind of poetry, bad and good, in evrything, everywhere we look.
connections connected happens
Even things which seem separate and finished are infinitely connected and will infinitely connect. This connection happens as soon as you let it, as soon as you engage - as soon as you even attempt to engage.
book needs alive
All we need to do, reader or writer, from first line to final page, is be as open as a book, and be alive to the life in language - on all its levels.
moving space corsets
Words are like untying a corset - you can move into this great space with them.
eye broken might
All we are is eyes looking for the unbroken or the edges where the broken bits might fit each other.
art way happens
Art makes nothing happen in a way that makes something happen.
heart reason
The head has its confines. The head’s got those all right, and the heart. The heart has its reasons.
tombstone want headstone
I don't want a tombstone. You could carve on it 'She never actually wanted a tombstone.'
art
Do you come to art to be comforted, or do you come to art to be re-skinned?