“My schoolmates could not understand why anyone would want to write a story; and, above all, they could not understand why I had called it The Voodoo of Hell’s Half-Acre. The mood out of which a story was written was the most alien thing conceivable to them.”

Black Boy (1945)

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 "My schoolmates could not understand why anyone would want to write a story; and, above all, they could not understand w…" by Richard Wright?

Richard Wright130

African-American writer 1908–1960

Related quotes

“I had gone thoroughly through some of the all-fiction magazines and I made up my mind that if people were paid for writing such rot as I read I could write stories just as rotten. Although I had never written a story, I knew absolutely that I could write stories just as entertaining and probably a lot more so than any I chanced to read in those magazines.
I knew nothing about the technique of story writing, and now, after eighteen years of writing, I still know nothing about the technique, although with the publication of my new novel, Tarzan and the Lost Empire, there are 31 books on my list. I had never met an editor, or an author or a publisher. l had no idea of how to submit a story or what I could expect in payment. Had I known anything about it at all I would never have thought of submitting half a novel; but that is what I did.
Thomas Newell Metcalf, who was then editor of The All-Story magazine, published by Munsey, wrote me that he liked the first half of a story I had sent him, and if the second half was as good he thought he might use it. Had he not given me this encouragement, I would never have finished the story, and my writing career would have been at an end, since l was not writing because of any urge to write, nor for any particular love of writing. l was writing because I had a wife and two babies, a combination which does not work well without money.”

Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875–1950) American writer

How I Wrote the Tarzan Books (1929)

“Every story I've written was written because I had to write it. Writing stories is like breathing for me; it is my life.”

Ray Bradbury (1920–2012) American writer

“I had someone at the Houston police station shoot me with heroin so I could do a story about it. The experience was a special kind of hell. I came out understanding full well how one could be addicted to 'smack,' and quickly.”

Dan Rather (1931) Journalist, Anchor

“Roland could not understand why anyone would want cocaine or any other illegal drug, for that matter, in a world where such a powerful one as sugar was so plentiful and cheap.”

Stephen King book The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three

Source: The Drawing of the Three

“The written word is holy…When we write our stories, it helps us bring understanding.”

Victor Villaseñor (1940) American writer

On the importance of gaining knowledge in “Author Victor Villaseñor talks 'Crazy Loco'” https://www.lmtonline.com/que_pasa/article/Author-Victor-Villase-or-talks-Crazy-Loco-10268363.php in LMT Online (2008 Dec 11)

“I was asked by thousands of people if I was going to write a book. A lot of them had shared in my story, and in ways I don't quite understand, they had found it helpful.”

Lauren Manning (1961) American banker

Survivor Lauren Manning finds 'new normal' after 9/11 http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/books/news/story/2011-08-29/Survivor-Lauren-Manning-finds-new-normal-after-911/50182388/1, USA Today, 29 August 2011