“A writer's age at the time of a work's composition is never irrelevant.” — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
You might 'write from the heart,' but you'd better polish with your brain. — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“... like a cat that crawls onto the page when you're trying to read.” — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
I began writing at the age of 5, but there was a dark period between the ages of 8 and 16 when… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Reading is one of the most individual things that happens. So every reader is going to read a piece in a slightly… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Anybody who writes a book is an optimist. First of all, they think they're going to finish it. Second, they think somebody's… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
I was once a graduate student in Victorian literature, and I believe as the Victorian novelists did, that a novel isn't simply… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
There's an epigram tacked to my office bulletin board, pinched from a magazine -- "Wanting to meet an author because you like… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
There's a difference between describing and evoking something. You can describe something and be quite clinical about it. To evoke it, you… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
A non-event ... is better to write about than an event, because with a non-event you can make up the meaning yourself,… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
I'm a novelist, and idle speculation is what novelists do. How odd to spend one's life trying to pretend that non-existent people… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
There are novels that end well, but in between there are human beings acting like human beings. And human beings are not… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“I keep on going with this sad and hungry and sordid, this limping and mutilated story, because after all I want you… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
You always think, 'Oh, if only I had a little chalet in the mountains! How great that would be and I'd do… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“I worked transferring books to computer discs, to cut down on storage space and replacement costs, they said. Discers, we called ourselves.… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“She writes like an angel, it says of Laura on the back of one of the editions of The Blind Assassin. An… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
While he writes, I feel as if he is drawing me; or not drawing me, drawing on me - drawing on my… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
It's a critical fallacy of our times ... that a writer should 'grow,' 'change,' or 'develop.' This fallacy causes us to expect… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
If it's all instruction, you get annoyed with it and bored, and you stop reading. If it's all entertainment, you read it… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Reading ... changes you. You aren't the same person after you've read a particular book as you were before, and you will… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
A ratio of failures is built into the process of writing. The wastebasket has evolved for a reason. Think of it as… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“Writing is not a job description. A great deal of it is luck. Don't do it if you are not a gambler… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
I don't think the relationship between novels and realities are one to one. Of course novels play different roles. It's essentially just… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“Possibly, then, writing has to do with darkness, and a desire or perhaps a compulsion to enter it, and, with luck, to… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Some cleric putting a match to her. /Neither of them looks happy about it. /Once lit, she'll burn like a book, /like… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Everyone thinks writers must know more about the inside of the human head, but that's wrong. They know less, that's why they… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Repeat reading for me shares a few things with hot-water bottles and thumbsucking: comfort, familiarity, the recurrence of the expected. — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
It's a feature of our age that if you write a work of fiction, everyone assumes that the people and events in… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
For me the experience of writing is really an experience of losing control… I think it's very much like dreaming or like… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Fiction is not necessarily about what you know, it's about how you feel. That is the truth about fiction, and the other… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
It's rather useless to write a gripping narrative with nothing in it but climate change because novels are always about people even… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
I have been known to buy e-versions of my books because I was in a hotel room and I needed one right… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
The short answer to 'Why do you write' is - I suppose I write for some of the same reasons I read:… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Publishing a book is like stuffing a note into a bottle and hurling it into the sea. Some bottles drown, some come… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
Teaching other people to write is not something I can do. The only kind of advice I can give them will be… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share Image
“I'm fine," said Pilar, "for the moment. And the moment is the only time we can be fine in.” — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
And yet it disturbs me to learn I have hurt someone unintentionally. I want all my hurts to be intentional. — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“Mary: Some call this "Eve's curse," but I think that is stupid because the real curse of Eve was having to put up with… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“The birds were singing around me, but I reflected that the very birds were strangers to me, for I did not even know their… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“Strange how we decorate pain. These ribbons, for instance, and the small hard teardrops of blood. Who are they for? Do we think the… — margaret atwood Copy Share
I wanted to forget the past, but it refused to forget me; it waited for sleep, then cornered me. — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“Back at home they drew the curtains and read, with disapproval, with relish, with avidity and glee - even the ones who'd never thought… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
All fiction is about people, unless it's about rabbits pretending to be people. It's all essentially characters in action, which means characters moving through… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“Simon walks back to the house alone. The night is clear and warm, with a moon, almost full, enclosed in a nimbus of mist;… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“There is indeed something delightful about being able to combine obedience and disobedience in the same act.” — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“Every time the women appear, Snowman is astonished all over again. They're every known colour from the deepest black to whitest white, they're various… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
Once you publish a book, it is out of your control. You cannot dictate how people read it. — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“The more difficult it was to love the particular man beside us, the more we believed in Love, abstract and total. We were waiting,… — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
“She knows she's deceiving herself about that, but she prefers to deceive herself. She desperately needs to believe such pure joy is still possible.” — Margaret Atwood Copy Share
