I have two young children, and I will say that motherhood is its own peak, just like in the process of writing: one climbs and is continuously moving with each book. Becoming a mother is the greatest connection I've ever felt to being spiritual.
I think that what I have been truly searching for as a person, as a writer, as a thinker, as a daughter, is freedom. That is my mission. A sense of liberty, the liberty that comes not only from self-awareness but also from letting go of many things. Many things that weigh us down.
I think, like any artist or any writer, I just want to have that pure freedom of expression and of thought - the freedom to explore and move in unexpected ways.
So that she began to see herself more clearly, as a thin film of dust was wiped from a sheet of glass.
Sometimes, so much of the difficulty is the question of 'What am I going to write about?' because the world is so vast.
Surely it is a magical thing for a handful of words, artfully arranged, to stop time. To conjure a place, a person, a situation, in all its specificity and dimensions. To affect us and alter us, as profoundly as real people and things do.
That the last two letters in her name were the first two in his, a silly thing he never mentioned to her but caused him to believe that they were bound together.
The imperfection became a mark of distinction about their home. Something visitors noticed, the first family anecdote that was told.
There's more than enough in the world I am currently writing about to last for several lifetimes of writing.
Why do I write? To investigate the mystery of existence. To tolerate myself. To get closer to everything that is outside of me.
Winning the Pulitzer is wonderful and it's an honour and I feel so humbled and so grateful, but I think that I'll think of it very much as the final sort of final moment for this book and put it behind me along with the rest of the book, as I write more books.
God, the supreme being, is neither circumscribed by space, nor touched by time; he cannot be found in a particular direction, and his essence cannot change. The secret conversation is thus entirely spiritual; it is a direct encounter between God and the soul, abstracted from all material constraints.
Connect with
Login with Facebook