Writer Quotes by Isabel Allende

I've been a story-teller all my life but I realized it only recently.

— Isabel Allende

A memoir is an invitation into another person's privacy.

— Isabel Allende

Write what should not be forgotten.

— Isabel Allende

Writing is a process, a journey into memory and the soul.

— Isabel Allende

Unfortunately for my family, they have a writer in the family.

— Isabel Allende

If I didn't write my soul would dry up and die.

— Isabel Allende

you can tell the deepest truths with the lies of fiction

— Isabel Allende

Writing is a calling, not a choice.

— Isabel Allende

Fiction happens in the womb. It doesn't get processed in the mind until you do the editing.

— Isabel Allende

I don't think of literature as an end in itself. It's just a way of communicating something.

— Isabel Allende

What happens in the world affects me. Sometimes, that's part of the writing.

— Isabel Allende

I'm aware of the mystery around us, so I write about coincidences, premonitions, emotions, dreams, the power of nature, magic.

— Isabel Allende

The library is inhabited by spirits that come out of the pages at night.

— Isabel Allende

I don't read thrillers, romance or mystery, and I don't read self-help books because I don't believe in shortcuts and loopholes.

— Isabel Allende

I get up every morning early, when the sky is red, and write for 10 hours.

— Isabel Allende

Only in romance novels or in thrillers people live outside of a social and political context.

— Isabel Allende

A memoir is my version of events. My perspective. I choose what to tell and what to omit. I choose the adjectives…

— Isabel Allende

I think that any writer who is commercial, who sells a lot of books, has to face criticism. Because the more hermetic…

— Isabel Allende

All stories interest me, and some haunt me until I end up writing them. Certain themes keep coming up: justice, loyalty, violence,…

— Isabel Allende

I write until the first draft is finished, and then I feel that I can get out. But, during the time of…

— Isabel Allende

I have more freedom when I write fiction, but my memoirs have had a much stronger impact on my readers. Somehow the…

— Isabel Allende

A book is not an end in itself; it is only a way to touch someone - a bridge extended across a…

— Isabel Allende

“This is the kind of detail that is forbidden in literature; in a book, no one would dare combine a full moon…

— Isabel Allende

When you tell a story in the kitchen to a friend, it's full of mistakes and repetitions. It's good to avoid that…

— Isabel Allende

In 2011, I announced that I was going to retire, and my agent panicked. So she says: 'No, no, no. You have…

— Isabel Allende

“Writing, when all is said and done, is an attempt to understand one's own circumstance and to clarify the confusion of existence,…

— Isabel Allende

A memoir forces me to stop and remember carefully. It is an exercise in truth. In a memoir, I look at myself,…

— Isabel Allende

January 8 has been a lucky day for me. I have started all my books on that day, and all of them…

— Isabel Allende

In the books I have written, I have created in my mind a universe. My kids say I have a village in…

— Isabel Allende

I confess that I am a messy, disorganized and impatient reader: if the book doesn't grab me in the first 40 pages,…

— Isabel Allende

fiction happens in the belly, it doesn't happen in the brain.

— Isabel Allende

A novel is achieved with hard work, the short story with inspiration.

— Isabel Allende

Writing is my job. I don't think of it as art.

— Isabel Allende

I try to write the kind of books I like to read.

— Isabel Allende

Having a point to start is important. You know that when you decide to write something it's like a commitment. It's like…

— Isabel Allende

“Writing is like riding a bicycle: you don’t forget how, even if you go for years without doing it.”

— Isabel Allende

“The writer and the dreamer have so much in common: They can't control the plot, they are always part of the story…

— Isabel Allende

All stories interest me, and some haunt me until I end up writing them.

— Isabel Allende

My writing comes not from the happy moments, but from struggle and grief.

— Isabel Allende

The connection that I have with my readers makes me very happy, and gives meaning to the strange profession of writing

— Isabel Allende