Judith Viorst Quotes

I definitely thought I was going to write books. I wrote a couple of children's books when I was like 11 when I was a child myself!

I think my parents recognised that I'd always wanted to be a writer, and so they didn't think that this was some idle, faddish wish on my part.

I was four when I announced my ambition to write, eight when I began publishing such claims.

Well I guess the plan was to write poetry and publish books and make a living from writing poetry. That was a pretty ambitious plan I guess.

When people asked me what I was going to do when I grow up, I always said, 'I'm going to be a writer. I'm going to write screenplays. I'm going to write books. I'm going to write plays. That's what I'm going to do.'

Today is the first of August. It is hot, steamy and wet. It is raining. I am tempted to write a poem. But I remember what it said on one rejection slip: 'After a heavy rainfall, poems titled 'Rain' pour in from across the nation.'

The way a small child might dream of visiting Disneyland, I dreamed of writing books. Never did I think my poems would become that.

I wrote poems in my corner of the Brooks Street station. I sent them to two editors who rejected them right off. I read those letters of rejection years later and I agreed with those editors.

I used to want to write commercials as a kid.

I always had a passion to write as a young girl.

At the age of 15, a teacher had asked me what I wanted to do for a career, and without knowing why or even how I replied that I wanted to be a poet.

I'd always wanted to write books ever since I was a kid.

I had a strong propensity, which I still have, to be invisible. In grade school, I'd try to disappear and become formless. I lived in a very imaginary world. I loved poetry and wrote my first novel when I was 9. It was about a little girl and the people she met in the woods.

I wanted to write a novel. At 12 I knew, I am a writer. I said it to nobody.

I wanted nothing less than to be a fiction writer when I was a kid. If you had told me I would be an artist or novelist when I grew up, I would have laughed in your face.

When I turned thirteen and took a typing class, with typical early teen enthusiasm and total lack of critical ability, I started sending my stuff to publishers once I'd babysat long enough to earn the postage.

I remember writing these terrible poems when I was, like, nine and discovered alliteration.

By 17, I was submitting to publications and collecting my first rejection slips.

I always thought of myself as a kind of literary bureaucrat. And that was never going to be enough for me.

I am an avid reader! As for writing, I might - someday. But we'll have to wait and see.

I always wanted to be a writer, from being a little kid onwards. My dad and my mum both had phases when that was what they did.

By the time I was 7 or 8, I wanted to be a comedy writer.

I told my parents when I was 12 I'd be a writer.

Maybe I was 7 - I probably am exaggerating a little - and immediately was plunged into the fact that there was an official place to put your fantasies. Up until then I didn't know what I would do with them all. It was very exciting for me, and I began very, very early on.

I was one of those kids who never wanted to be anything but a novelist. And I don't know a lot of people who truly live the life that they dreamed of.