Alice McDermott Quotes

How many authors are there among writers? Author means originator.

Marguerite Duras was a very good friend of mine and an intellectual hero. She was also a sort of mother figure. Of course she was an influence.

I always knew I wanted to be a writer. I just wasn't sure what I wanted to do as a money-making job.

When somebody asks what I do, I guess I say 'writer' first.

I want to be a writer someday.

Historian: an unsuccessful novelist.

In my next incarnation, I want to be a writer.

Geoff Dyer is an abundantly talented writer.

These days I find myself wanting to avoid being pigeon-holed, ghettoized, held in a different category than other authors. And when people ask me if I'm a black writer, or just a writer who happens to be black, I tend to say that it's either a dumb question or a question which happens to be dumb.

I'm far less a leader than a writer.

I've come to think of myself as a writer of books.

Being a woman writer, I would be deceiving myself if I said I write completely through the eye of a man. There's nothing bad in it, but that does not make me a feminist writer. I hate that name. The tag is from the Western world - like we are called the Third World.

I didn't have a dream of being a press secretary, I had a dream of being a playwright; I had a dream of being a novelist and a poet.

All the definitions people want to put on you in terms of what kind of writer you are come with hidden meanings. If you're writing science fiction, you're writing rocket ships. If you write dystopian fiction, it's inequity where The Man must be fought.

In Washington, there's always an effort to label people.

I think of myself now as a writer, although I wouldn't go as far as to say 'novelist' because that sounds like a Victorian person.

I didn't even know for years that people ever even got paid for this, because they don't teach you that in school. They don't say Shakespeare got a check.

But here's the thing: what you do as a screenwriter is you sell your copyright. As a novelist, as a poet, as a playwright, you maintain your copyright.

What genre it falls under is only of interest later.

I love Oscar Wilde, still the wittiest writer of anyone, dead or living.

Writers never feel comfortable having labels attached to them, however accurate they are.

I'm not - I'm not going to define people by labels: who's a real Republican, who's not a real Republican.

We live in a society that wants to label you with a color, sexuality, religion, or ethnicity. It divides us, but it also allows us to find pride in our identity.

My heroes: Nick Cave, Tom Waits, Nina Simone.

I don't want to be regarded as a female pundit. I'm a pundit.