Writing Quotes by Patti Smith

I've written a lot of prose. I just haven't published it.

— Patti Smith

Often the simplest song is the hardest to write.

— Patti Smith

Freedom is...the right to write the wrong words.

— Patti Smith

Writing is not some quiet, closet act.

— Patti Smith

“Why do we write? A chorus erupts. Because we cannot simply live.”

— Patti Smith

It was no hardship to me to spend long hours reading and writing.

— Patti Smith

I've always considered myself a writer.

— Patti Smith

When I was young, all I wanted was to write books and be an artist.

— Patti Smith

Why can't I write something that would awake the dead? That pursuit is what burns most deeply.

— Patti Smith

I've never felt grounded because of my ancestry or my gender. I think until women get away from that they're not going…

— Patti Smith

Then I read Little Women, and of course, like a lot of really young girls, I was very taken with Jo -…

— Patti Smith

I've always had a desire to write something and capture people's imagination like Peter Pan had captured mine.

— Patti Smith

I dreamed of having a book of my own, of writing one that I could put on a shelf.

— Patti Smith

I didn't write about aspects of my public life because that's a small part of my life.

— Patti Smith

I'd try to write my poems in a certain rhythm. I had my rock 'n' roll stuff for performing and my denser…

— Patti Smith

I wasn't taking drugs or drinking. I was working and working and working. But I wasn't writing anything.

— Patti Smith

I don't consider writing a quiet, closet act. I consider it a real physical act. When I'm home writing on the typewriter,…

— Patti Smith

Most women writers don't interest me because they're hung up with being a woman, they're hung up with being Jewish, they're hung…

— Patti Smith

I wasn't writing, I wasn't drawing, and personality-wise, I was just completely arrogant. I'm not trying to be overly apologetic for my…

— Patti Smith

When I was young, I knew William Burroughs really well. And William's secret desire, which he never quite did, was to write…

— Patti Smith

I have abandoned so many projects but in the '80s when I left public life to be married and have real children…

— Patti Smith

I always hesitate when people call me a musician.I have had no musical training. I can't play anything. I really think of…

— Patti Smith

Poetry is a solitary process. One does not write poetry for the masses. Poetry is a self-involved, lofty pursuit. Songs are for…

— Patti Smith

After writing all day I go for a walk and see a piece of architecture i want to photograph and i have…

— Patti Smith

If I have any regrets, I could say that I'm sorry I wasn't a better writer or a better singer...When I was…

— Patti Smith

When I was home, traditionally since I was young, I'd write in cafés. That was the romantic notion in 1963. Café atmospheres…

— Patti Smith

“...slowly I discerned a familiar shift in my concentration. That compulsion that prohibits me from completely surrendering to a work of art,…

— Patti Smith

We all make choices. Believe me, I would like to write the hit of the world. It's not like I have any…

— Patti Smith

Sometimes you write passages that don't need to be rewritten. Performance is that for me. Improvisation, things that happen in the moment,…

— Patti Smith

“Why can’t I write something that would awake the dead? That pursuit is what burns most deeply. I got over the loss…

— Patti Smith

“Now, I can tell you about some women writers who truly are fantastic. One is Anna Kavan. She writes stories like I…

— Patti Smith

“A writer or any artist can’t expect to be embraced by the people. I've done records where it seemed like no one…

— Patti Smith

I never really wanted to be a singer - not with any longevity. But I always wanted to be a writer.

— Patti Smith

Good press, bad press, whatever, only means a lot to me if it's writ by somebody I respect, by somebody I like.

— Patti Smith

If I'm really working on something, writing or painting or really concentrating, I don't even think about brushing my hair.

— Patti Smith

I wrote every day. I don't think I could have written 'Just Kids' had I not spent all of the 80s developing…

— Patti Smith

All the traumas I went through separating art from writing don't exist anymore. That's why I love being in rock 'n' roll.…

— Patti Smith

I always wanted to be an artist, writer and poet since I was seven, and one has to live long enough to…

— Patti Smith

If I have any regrets, I could say that I'm sorry I wasn't a better writer or a better singer.

— Patti Smith

What I wanted in life always was to write something as good as 'Pinocchio.' I wanted to write. I wanted to evolve.…

— Patti Smith