Francisco Goldman Quotes

I think once you write fiction, you put it out, and it can be interpreted in a variety of ways, some of which are going to be shocking to the writer.

The plot! The plot! What kind of plot could a poet possibly provide that is not surpassed by the thinking, feeling reader? Form alone is divine.

I try to avoid describing one interpretation of my books. Of course I have an opinion. I have things I want to say, but I don't ever want to limit anybody, to have them say, 'Oh, he said this, so that's what it's about.' I'm happy people bring their own stuff to it.

I don't know whether a poem has be there to help to develop something. I think it's there for itself, for what the reader finds in it.

I can't read my poem "Distracted by an Ergonomic Bicycle" without thinking of Seattle, where the events of the poem took place, and I can't read "In Defense of the Semicolon" without thinking of Toronto - but why should that matter to anyone else? If another reader imagines "In Defense of the Semicolon" taking place in New Orleans, great.

I'm really shocked when critics get morally outraged at my fiction because they think I'm condoning what's going on. I never come in as the author and say, "Hey, okay. I'm interrupting the narrator here. I'm Bret Easton Ellis, and I'm the author."

I've had people explain to me what one of my poems meant, and I've been surprised that it means that to them. If a person can use a poem of mine to interpret her life or his life, good. I can't control that. Nor would I want to.

I didn't think of the narrative as making a judgment. It didn't occur to me the reader would either, but that doesn't mean it isn't possible there would be that risk.

I do like people to read the books twice, because I write my novels about ideas which concern me deeply and I think are important, and therefore I want people to take them seriously. And to read it twice of course is taking it seriously.

Literature is the only art in which the audience performs the score.

I never write with any kind of message, and I don't think that this book, 'Goodbye, Stranger' has a message in the capital M form of the word but I do hope it makes people ask themselves questions about what they think.

I can't do movies where you start thinking "Where's the commercial appeal? How are we going to market this?" It's not that kind of party.

I don't think he (Joseph Albers, fh) ever realized that it was his discipline that I came for. Besides, my response to what I learned from him was just the opposite of what he intended.. ..I was very hesitant about arbitrarily designing forms and selecting colors that would achieve some predetermined result, because I didn't have any ideas to support that sort of thing - I didn't want color to serve me, in other words.

I never read a novel, they have so little real life and thought in them.

I'm older now, and I been through that, like, 'Stop. Tell the truth, what I need to do?' And I think that's important, as far as artist, for me to stand for what I believe in, And a lot of times people don't like that, you know what I'm saying. You become a troubled artist, or, 'You don't listen,' but as long as I say 'Yeah, I'll do it!' I'm a good person.

The absence of plot leaves the reader room to think about other things.

Every book is three books, after all; the one the writer intended, the one the reader expected, and the one that casts its shadow when the first two meet by moonlight.

I don't enjoy being told what to do, I'm not that kind of actor, I'm a thinking actor.

[Sometimes] I will go through periods where I will think 'Oh maybe I should do a commercial movie' and then I just think, someone gave me a really great piece of advice, someone from my agency weirdly, they said the only clients that are happy are the ones that just do what they want to do. So I just kind of do everything for myself.

I do not think my painting has ever been revolutionary. It was not directed against any kind of painting. I have never wanted to prove that I was right and someone else wrong.

After all, poets shouldn't be their own interpreters and shouldn't carefully dissect their poems into everyday prose; that would mean the end of being poets. Poets send their creations into the world, it is up to the reader, the aesthetician, and the critic to determine what they wanted to say with their creations.

I love doing readings. I could really give a crap about reviews. It's kind of about the readers.

I don't think music can be held. I don't think artists can be put into boxes or places. It's all about creating and making the best music you can.

Rather than thinking in terms of a specific genre or specific kind of thing, I hope I can just stay relatively small and keep making my movies. If I can keep writing them and making them, I'll be happy.