your soul needs to be lonely so that its strangest elements can moil about, curl and growl and jump, fail and get triumphant, all inside you. Sociable people have the most trouble hearing their unconscious. They have trouble getting rid… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
The secret of literature, which conventional people don't guess, is that writers are forever looking for the surprising revelation - not for reinforcement of… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
The more original a short-story writer, the odder looking the assortment of things he or she puts together for a story. — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
No work of literature is the product of only one or two conscious ideas. A story is mysteriously dense of meaning. — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
Emily was feeling the elation of conscientious hosts when they can temporarily escape a ubiquitous houseguest. — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
For a short-story writer, a story is the combination of what the writer supposed the story would likely be about - plus what actually… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
An essay is a work of literary art which has a minimum of one anecdote and one universal idea. — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
There isn't a thought or feeling that doesn't alter or deepen when written. We are a writing animal. That is why all of us… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
Unlike lions and dogs, we are a dissenting animal. We need to dissent in the same way that we need to travel, to make… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
Literature has low enough standards. But we can avoid writing the worst literature if we make ourselves ask ourselves, every two or three sentences… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
The six and one-fourth hours' television watching (the American average per day) which non-reading children do is what is called alpha-level learning. The mind… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
I don't engage in self-censorship. But I do change everybody to have red hair in the last draft. ... If you give people red… — Carol Bly Copy Share Image
