When I start a book, I write a minimum of five pages every day, except weekends. If I'm going on a ski trip, I take my computer with me, get up at six, do my five pages, and then go skiing.
When I write songs, when I sing songs, I don't have anybody in mind. I'm just trying to express what I think people are feeling.
I write entirely in English; Tagalog chauvinists chide me for this. I feel no guilt in doing so. But I am sad that I cannot write in my native Ilokano. History demanded this; if it isn't English I am using now, I would most probably be writing in Spanish like Rizal, or even German or Japanese.
I don't write songs that don't affect me on some level, because I figure if I am not moved by it, if its not something that I have a longing to celebrate or to be reminded of, if it doesn't affect me, then how can I possibly think it is going to affect somebody else. My touchstone is write something that matters.
I don't write things that are wildly abstractly atonal.
I think writers of memoirs need to be respected for the bold decision they take to bare their lives open. That alone should be enough. The things I write about, if you notice, are sensitive issues for a lot of people. If I told you my age, they would get ideas. The next thing you know they'll be filing lawsuits against me.
To write lyrics and sing stuff used to be a real chore for me, especially before this 'Diamond Eyes' record. I was spending years making records.
All my songs come from me because I only seem able to write about myself and my experiences.
If you write a novel alone you sit and you weave a little narrative. And it's O.K., but it's of no account.
For 20 years, Simon & Schuster asked me, 'Why don't you write your autobiography?'
I'd go to the farmers' market in Santa Barbara, and I'd put out my guitar case, and I'd test out these little ditty songs that I would write, and I would get a couple of avocados, a bag of pistachios, and, like, fifteen bucks. That was a lot of money for me.
When I teach writing, I always tell my students you should assume that the audience you're writing for is smarter than you. You can't write if you don't think they're on your side, because then you start to yell at them or preach down to them.
I don't write to create performance material; I write to make books.
I think I subconsciously put myself in these situations where the girlfriend isn't pleased with me. I'm useless as a boyfriend. That's how I managed to write all these songs.
When I write, I talk about stories and things that are happening in my life. I come from the church. There was a time in my life when I actually had that transformation and relationship with God.
You'll go mad trying to figure out what people want. I don't bother. I write the stories I want to read.
When I was younger, I used to write to directors when I was unsure I could play a role. I'd say: 'You've made a terrible mistake.'
You have to be able to invest in your own creations, to suspend your own disbelief in order to be able to write them. We all have to draw the line somewhere.
If I want to write a movie, I'll write a screenplay, but if I have an idea for a book, it's something that I think can only be done novelistically.
You should write, first of all, to please yourself. You shouldn't care a damn about anybody else at all. But writing can't be a way of life; the important part of writing is living. You have to live in such a way that your writing emerges from it.
Simple is the only way I can write.
My personal view is that until there is a disincentive to write lies and abusive comments it's going to continue.
I write because I'm in love with language; because I like working for myself, inside my head; and because it's the only way I know to make a stab at answering the never-ending questions of the heart that arise simply from the everyday living of our lives.
I think of my books now as suspense novels, usually with a love story incorporated. They're absolutely a lot harder to write than romances. They take more plotting and real character development.
I think it's a bit of a myth that if you can read music you can write music. It doesn't work like that.
I wasn't involved, except to the degree that they sent me drafts of the script as the writer turned them in. They asked me at one point to write a memo about what I thought of it.
When I write about my childhood I think, oh my God, how did I ever get from there to here? Not that any great thing has happened to me. But I felt so tiny, so lost.
I think that Bob Dylan knows this more than all of us: you don't write the songs anyhow. So if you're lucky, you can keep the vehicle healthy and responsive over the years. If you're lucky, your own intentions have very little to do with this.
Every time I write a new novel about something sombre and sobering and terrible I think, 'oh Lord, they're not going to want to go here'. But they do. Readers of fiction read, I think, for a deeper embrace of the world, of reality. And that's brave.
As a songwriter, you tend to develop your own style, your own technique, based around what it is you're trying to write and perform, in terms of your own music. So a way of evolving a guitar style as a songwriter is much easier, I think, than developing a true style of your own just from listening to music or playing other people's music.
Older teens tend to write to me and say, 'Thank you for not writing down to teenagers.' And then there are the letters from adults who say, 'This is such a good book; why did you write it for teens?'
Almost all the producers I know and dig, like Quincy Jones or Brian Eno, are really musicians first. I'm a composer, an orchestrator, an arranger and a musician first. I know how to write and rewrite songs, and the genius is really in the rewriting.
Everyone has their dreams. I don't write my dreams down; they just live inside of me.
I heard somewhere that whenever you write a book, people will ask you One Question about it over and over. And while I'm no expert in these matters, this is proving to be true. My first book dealt with a not-that-pleasant degenerate type, and the One Question was, 'Is this an autobiographical story?'
Once I started writing novels, I understood how hard it was to write really good short stories.
I can't not write, if I don't then I get really depressed.
