Annie Dillard
Annie Dillard
Annie Dillardis an American author, best known for her narrative prose in both fiction and non-fiction. She has published works of poetry, essays, prose, and literary criticism, as well as two novels and one memoir. Her 1974 work Pilgrim at Tinker Creek won the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction. Dillard taught for 21 years in the English department of Wesleyan University, in Middletown, Connecticut...
ProfessionNon-Fiction Author
Date of Birth30 April 1945
CityPittsburgh, PA
mind doe would-be
The mind of the writer does indeed do something before it dies, and so does its owner, but I would be hard put to call it living.
self doe world
The painter... does not fit the paints to the world. He most certainly does not fit the world to himself. He fits himself to the paint. The self is the servant who bears the paintbox and its inherited contents.
writing doe peculiar
For writing a first draft requires from the writer a peculiar internal state which ordinary life does not induce. ... how to set yourself spinning?
flower pet doe
Does anything eat flowers. I couldn't recall having seen anything eat a flower - are they nature's privileged pets?
discipline doe littles
Doing something does not require discipline. It creates its own discipline - with a little help from caffeine.
time-flies duration doe
No, the point is not only does time fly and do we die, but that in these reckless conditions we live at all, and are vouchsafed, for the duration of certain inexplicable moments, to know it.
trying causes ashes
Don't save something good for a later place. Don't hold back from your students, from the poor, don't try to keep anything for yourself 'cause it'll turn to ashes.
years quitting notes
I had good innings, as the British say. I wrote for 38 years at the top of my form, and I wanted to quit on a high note.
nice writing thinking
I write in my own journal when something extraordinary or funny happens. And there's some nice imagery in there. I don't think of what to do with it.
creative painting process
The creative process obtains in all creative acts. So if I'm painting suddenly I'll see something that I didn't see before.
vacation people remember
People who take photographs during their whole vacation won't remember their vacation. They'll only remember what photographs they took.
memories writing easy
Old memories are very easy to get except that once you write about something you've destroyed it.
years waking would-be
I noticed this process of waking, and predicted with terrifying logic that one of these years not far away I would be awake continuously and never slip back, and never be free of myself again.
book writing long
It makes more sense to write one big book - a novel or nonfiction narrative - than to write many stories or essays. Into a long, ambitious project you can fit or pour all you possess and learn.