“Jen's Mum Will WriteJen's mum writes advertising copy.She specializes in white goods:washing machines, dryers, fridges,freezers, dishwashers.She hates these applianceshulkingin corners,power-hungry and fractious.One day, she will have a wood stove,and she'll write about things that matter-she will write about birth and death,about love and the absence of love,about fathers and children,about mothers and daughters,about lovers and friends.She'll write about the whole goddamnwonderful, awful businessof loving and being loved”
“Beyond just writing about falling in love and out of love and wanting to do certain things and going out and partying and all the things that I grew up writing about, I want to write about deeper things.”
“I need to write about love. I need to think and think and write about love-otherwise, my soul won’t survive.”
“The secret is not to write about what you love best, but about what you, alone, love at all.”
“What's wrong with writing about love? Everybody longs for love.”
“We journalists love writing about eccentrics. We hate writing about impenetrable, boring people. It makes us look bad: the duller the interviewee, the duller the prose. If you want to get away with wielding true, malevolent power, be boring.”
“Write about patriotism, about victory and defeat. Write about revolutions and rebels and prisoners and wars. About emotions, of love and hatred and disappointment and regret. Intangible love and uncolored hatred and heartbreaking disappointments and abysmal regrets. Write about the seven deadly sins, about stealth and murder and gluttony and greed. Don’t forget to write about saints and sinners all the same. Write the poor and the rich using the same words, make them equal for once. Write about mothers who lost their children, about those who never had to lose; I challenge you to tell me which hurts more. Write about darkness and light, about light in the dark and darkness in the light. Remember to write about lost friendships, about those who never found a shoulder when life shut its lights dim, or those who kept the secret to their sadness within. Be fair to them too. Remind the world of those who always had someone to love but not someone to love them back, craft their nights and dreams carefully. Don’t forget the writers, who keep promises with words and silence. Be subtle. Be warm. Remember heartbeats and heartbreaks. Remember everything, remember all, equally.And then let the world remind you: Words will never be fair to whatever you write.”