“Writers don't write from experience, although many are hesitant to admit that they don't…. If you wrote from experience, you'd get maybe one book, maybe three poems. Writers write from empathy.”

Source: The Carrie Diaries

As quoted in International Herald Tribune (Paris, 5 November 1991)

Source: Ordinary Genius: A Guide for the Poet Within

Kung Fu Grippe http://www.kungfugrippe.com/post/6004196999/like-hammers
Websites, The KungFu Grippe Tumblr website

Source: The City of Dreaming Books

Letter to his brother Jeff from Guadalcanal (28 January 1943); p. 28
To Reach Eternity (1989)
Context: I'm going to ask you something. If I do get killed, and I honestly don't see how I can help it, I want you to write that book we were thinking about when I enlisted. If I get it, it's a cinch I won't be able to do it, and it would make me feel a whole lot better to know that if not my name and hand, at least, the thot of me would be passed on and not forgotten entirely. You know, sort of put into the book the promise that I had and the things I might have written so at least the knowledge of talent wasted won't be lost... If I get it, no one will ever know to what heights I might have gone as a writer. Maybe if you wrote about the promise that was there, all wouldn't be lost.

Source: "Interview with “In the Same Breath” Director Nanfu Wang" in Film Festival Today https://filmfestivaltoday.com/interviews/interview-with-in-the-same-breath-director-nanfu-wang (23 August 2021)