Barry Hannah quotes

Randomness I love. And I still love just a holler right in the middle of an ongoing narrative. Pain or joy, ecstasy. (Barry Hannah)
I found out about reviews early on. They're mostly written by sad men on bad afternoons. That's probably why I'm less angry than some writers, who are so narcissistic they consider every line of every review, even a thoughtful one, as major treason. View quote
Barry Hannah
Voice comes to you through a spell, a trance. The best voices are not you... they're a little away from you. View quote
Barry Hannah
I'll tell you why I like writing: it's just jumping into a pool. I get myself into a kind of trance. I engage the world, but it's also wonderful to just escape. I try to find the purities out of the confusion. It's pretty old-fashioned, but it's fun. View quote
Barry Hannah
My best stories come out of nowhere, with no concern for form at all. View quote
Barry Hannah
Most novels I come across have all the excitement of a long trip on a bus with a sensitive glee club. Yammer and chat. View quote
Barry Hannah
I was always kind of florid. And full of rhetoric. That was my flaw. My whole time writing, I've had to work against that because it can be a wrecking posture. View quote
Barry Hannah
When you're not involved, other people's unhappiness seems to be about the funniest damn thing on earth because you think you can solve it, that you are God, that you are above this, and that their unhappiness is just such useless toil and agony. If it's you, it ceases to be a comedy. View quote
Barry Hannah
I wanted very much to be Miles Davis when I was a boy, but without the practice. It just looked like an endless road. View quote
Barry Hannah
I lost my second marriage because of drinking, and I loved the woman very much. But I thought I needed booze to write. I'm glad I was disabused. View quote
Barry Hannah
I grew up when people seemed actually to be hurting themselves for their art. Of course, some of it was phony. (Barry Hannah)
Some writers are curiously unmusical. I don't get it. I don't get them. For me, music is essential. I always have music on when I'm doing well. Writing and music are two different mediums, but musical phrases can give you sentences that you didn't think you ever had. View quote
Barry Hannah
Love and despair go hand in hand. View quote
Barry Hannah
You've got to lie to stay halfway interested in yourself. View quote
Barry Hannah
What a bog and labyrinth the human essence is... We are all overbrained and overemotioned. View quote
Barry Hannah
I don't write under the ghost of Faulkner. I live in the same town and find his life and work inspiring, but that's it. I have a motorcycle and tool along the country lanes. I travel at my own speed. View quote
Barry Hannah
I distrust thought. The interior life is highly overrated. I don't like the wispy and the vague... or inductive logic in any kind of writing. I'm impatient with writers who make too much sense. The better things that I've done have come to me by instinct. View quote
Barry Hannah
I don't go around thinking about regret; regret doesn't consume me as a person... I'm not certain about whether any writer, any artist, any musician, can write without regret, so I don't think perhaps it's even particularly Southern. View quote
Barry Hannah
A writer's job is to destroy and then to build the thing back up again by a chosen means. View quote
Barry Hannah

Barry Hannah

Occupation: American Novelist
Born: April 23, 1942
Died: March 1, 2010
Quotes count: 19

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