“Looking back, I imagine I was always writing. Twaddle it was too. But better far write twaddle or anything, anything, than nothing at all.”

—  Katherine Mansfield

Journal entry (July 1922), published in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Looking back, I imagine I was always writing. Twaddle it was too. But better far write twaddle or anything, anything, t…" by Katherine Mansfield?
Katherine Mansfield photo
Katherine Mansfield 43
New Zealand author 1888–1923

Related quotes

Jamaica Kincaid photo

“Everything I do is because of writing. If I go for a walk, it’s because I’m thinking of writing. I go look at flowers, I go look at the garden, I go look at a museum, but it’s all coming back to writing. I don’t really do anything that isn’t about writing, and I don’t really know who I am if I’m not thinking about writing.”

Jamaica Kincaid (1949) Antiguan-American novelist, essayist, gardener, and gardening writer

On her obsession with writing in “Jamaica Kincaid: Does Truth Have a Tone?” https://www.guernicamag.com/does-truth-have-a-tone/ in Guernica (2013 Jun 17)

David Sedaris photo

“At first, writing for The New Yorker was very scary to me. I couldn't imagine anything that I would write in that typeface.”

David Sedaris (1956) American author
Mao Zedong photo

“Those writings of mine aren't anything. There is nothing instructive in what I wrote.”

Mao Zedong (1893–1976) Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China

Excerpt of meeting with Nixon 1972, quoted in The Road to War: Presidential Commitments Honored and Betrayed https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Road_to_War/SDb3PSD__KwC?hl=en&gbpv=0 (May 9, 2013) by Marvin Kalb
1970s

“If corn circles came from enlightened aliens,
Rather than Wiltshire pranksters on cider.
If channellers could speak in hieroglyphics,
Instead of pop-psychological twaddle.
If sharing, caring, non-sexist men,
Could do anything useful in a crisis.”

Peter J. Carroll (1953) British occultist

Source: PsyberMagick (1995), p. 65
Context: New Age-ism
I could Love it: —
If dolphins had as much intelligence as cats,
And stopped trying to rescue sinking pieces of wood.
If crystals actually did something useful,
Other than grease the wheels of commerce.
If the Goddess had made animals taste less good,
So I didn't want to eat them.
If astrology could tell me anything,
Other than the trite and obvious.
If whales could do something more impressive,
Than merely occupy a lot of space.
If corn circles came from enlightened aliens,
Rather than Wiltshire pranksters on cider.
If channellers could speak in hieroglyphics,
Instead of pop-psychological twaddle.
If sharing, caring, non-sexist men,
Could do anything useful in a crisis.

Jordan Peterson photo

“It is far better to become something than to remain anything but become nothing.”

Jordan Peterson book Beyond Order

Source: Books, Beyond Order (2021), p. 188

Anne Morrow Lindbergh photo

“I want to write — I want to write — I want to write and never never never will. I know it and I am so unhappy and it seems as though nothing else mattered. Whatever I'm doing, it's always there, an ultimate longing there saying, "Write this — write that — write —" and I can't. Lack ability, time, strength, and duration of vision. I wish someone would tell me brutally, "You can never write anything.”

Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1906–2001) American aviator and author

Take up home gardening!"
Bring Me a Unicorn (1971)

“Sir, please do not write anything about me. I am an insignificant person. If you wish to write anything, then write about Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda. That will benefit humanity.”

Swami Adbhutananda Disciple

When Sharat Chandra Chakrabarty, a disciple fo Vivekananda asked Adbhutananda for permission to write his biography.
Source: God Lived with Them, p.395

Margaret Mitchell photo

“I do not write with ease, nor am I ever pleased with anything I write. And so I rewrite.”

Margaret Mitchell (1900–1949) American author and journalist

Related topics