5 for Friday: Audience

5 writers on audience from For Writers Only, by Sophy Burnham

“Any
writer overwhelmingly honest about pleasing himself is almost sure to
please
others.”

-Marianne
Moore

“Why I
write. Of course I stole this title for this talk from George Orwell. One reason
I stole it was that I like the sound of the words: Why I write. There you have
three short unambiguous words that share a sound, and the sound they share is
this:

I

I

I

-Joan
Didion

“There
is only one real deprivation, I decided this morning, and that is not to be able
to give one’s gift to those one loves most. The gift turned inward, unable to
be given, becomes a heavy burden, even something a kind of poison. It is as
thought the flow of life were backed up.”

-May
Sarton

“Each
of us is like a desert, and a literary work is like a cry from the desert, or
like the pigeon let loose with a message in its claws, or like a bottle thrown
into the sea. The point is: to be heard—even if by one single person.”

-Francois
Mauriac

“Only connect.”

-E.M
Forster