As an artist, I feel a certain responsibility to write about difficult subject matter. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
It infuriates me that the work of white American writers can be universal and lay claim to classic texts, while black and… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
That's why I write fiction, because I want to write these stories that people will read and find universal. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I wanted to write about the experiences of the poor and the black and the rural people of the South. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
My time in New York really clarified things for me. I thought, 'What could I do with my life that would give… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
The first writer that I think of immediately that I studied with at Michigan is Peter Ho Davies. He was really important… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I dabbled in writing, wrote really bad poetry in high school. I also took a few writing classes when I was an… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
After I finished my first draft of 'Salvage the Bones,' I felt that I wasn't political enough. I had to be more… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
If I could chat with anyone, it would be Claire Messud, because I think she could tell me how to get better… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
In the past, I've felt like an outsider, with New York the center of everything literary, but right now, there are new… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I've been in so many writing workshops where someone hands in a story, and when the other writers in the workshop are… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I wrote poetry in middle school and high school and even through college. It was bad. I just don't think I'm very… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I worked with several writers at the University of Michigan: Nicholas Delbanco, Peter Ho Davies, Eileen Pollack, Laura Kasischke, and Thomas Lynch,… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I love creating that community and writing about that place, because I think, in some ways, Bois Sauvage is like the DeLisle… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
The reason that I like to use classical myths as models is because African American writers and African American stories are usually… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I've found that in fiction - and this is just the kind of writer I am - I can't really work from… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I think that voodoo as a spiritual tradition has been demonized for so long in popular culture. I wanted to write against… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I've also never written about home in this way before. I guess a lot of it is subconscious and I am intuitively… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
There are things about the South - the politics, the classism, the racism - that I hate, and I want to be… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
It felt like an indulgence. Going back was painful, but, at the same time, it was nice to live with them again… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
When I decided to write about my brother and friends, I was attempting to answer the question why. Why did they all… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I hope that if the people who read my work encounter people in the real world who are like the characters that… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I want each character to be as unique as possible. I want them to reflect something of who they are in the… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I'm writing about the things I see all around me. Growing up in Mississippi, I've seen how these backward ideas about class… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I came to the realization that I had failed in some respects because I had been more of a benevolent narrator than… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I think, when I write, one of the things that I'm really attempting to do is I'm attempting to humanize my characters. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I'm a failed poet. Reading poetry helps me to see the world differently, and I try to infuse my prose with figurative… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
It took me a long time to write again because Katrina destroyed the home I loved, and that robbed me of hope. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
It's very hard to deal with true subject matter, especially when you're writing about such weighty issues. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
When I was writing my first novel, 'Where the Line Bleeds,' which had young black men as its main characters, I was… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
While I admire writers who are able to write with a vitality based on order and action, I work in a different… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
It's always hard for a writer to make herself into a character; I had to figure out what my defining characteristics were,… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I've heard some writers say that they are obsessed with certain ideas and that they find themselves writing around the same obsession… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I feel like the kind of people I write about are the kind of people I grew up with, the families that… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
By the time I wrote my memoir, 'Men We Reaped,' I had been running from writing it for a long time. When… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I'm not saying I have to write a book that's ten times better than my counterparts, but I do think that I… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I could stifle my voice, or strip it. I know that I could, because we can do anything we put our minds… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share Image
I wanted to write about voodoo tradition that I feel has been very important to survival of black people here: people of the African… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
I think that voodoo as a spiritual tradition has been demonized for so long in popular culture. I wanted to write against that and… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
There's so much I love about home, but then there's a lot that I can acknowledge that I dislike about home. And acknowledging that… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
“The dream of her was the glow of a spent fire on a cold night: warm and welcoming.” — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
The first writer that I think of immediately that I studied with at Michigan is Peter Ho Davies. He was really important to me,… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
I feel like so much of what happened in the Delta over the decades since slavery was abolished seems much closer in the Delta,… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
“Vines catch my arms, my head; we tear through until we break out into the clearing before the fence, the field, the barn, the… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
“Before all the little mean things she told me gathered and gathered and lodged like grit in a skinned knee.” — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
People give the South a bad rap. It's often stereotyped as backwards and close-minded and dogmatic, and all of those things have been true.… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
By the time I wrote my memoir, 'Men We Reaped,' I had been running from writing it for a long time. When the events… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
When I was a teenager, I was the only black girl at a small, private Episcopal school, where my tuition was paid by the… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
She was the murderous mother who cut us to the bone but left us alive, left us naked and bewildered as wrinkled newborn babies,… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
I hope people who read my books feel empathy for us and really see us as complicated people. — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
When I was writing my first novel, 'Where the Line Bleeds,' which had young black men as its main characters, I was very invested… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
“Lot of folks was in there for stealing food because everybody was poor and starving, and even though White people couldn’t get your work… — Jesmyn Ward Copy Share
