William H. Gass - True Quotes

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Getting even is one great reason for writing. The precise statement of the motive is tricky, but the clearest expression of my unwholesome nature and my mean motives (apart from trying to write well) appears in a line I like in In the Heart of the Heart of the Country. The character says, I want to rise so high that when I shit I won't miss anybody. But maybe I say it's a motive because I like the line. Anyway, my work proceeds almost always from a sense of aggression. And usually I am in my best working mood when I am, on the page, very combative, very hostile. That's true even when I write to praise, as is often the case.

William H. Gass

The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words.

William H. Gass

Freud thought that a psychosis was a waking dream, and that poets were daydreamers too, but I wonder if the reverse is not as often true, and that madness is a fiction lived in like a rented house

William H. Gass