“The first book is always the most fun, because when you write your first book you’re just a writer. Then you get published. Then you become an author, and once you’re an author the whole thing changes. You have a track record. You have a public. A certain literary persona. You can become very self-conscious and start to compete with yourself. No fun at all.”
Richard Price
more infosource: The Paris Review Interviews, vol. I (New York: Picador, 2006), 383.
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category: author, compete, first book, fun, persona, publishing, self-conscious, track record, writer, writing
medium: interview
notes: Originally published in Issue 138 of The Paris Review, 1996.
“It was only when I wrote my first book that the world I wanted to live in opened to me.”
Anaïs Nin
more infosource: The Diary of Anaïs Nin (Vol. 1 1931–1934) (New York: The Swallow Press, 1966), 185.
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category: creativity, first book, writing
medium: diary
“Count yourself lucky…You’re still promising until your first book’s out.”
Mary Karr
more infosource: Lit (New York: Harper, 2009), 68.
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category: career, first book, literary agent, publishing, writing
medium: memoir
first book