Novelist
Usually, my irrational bargaining goes something like this: I start working at around 10 if I’m feeling motivated, 11 if I’m not.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2017
Arts and letters
People on the record here who work in arts and letters, and what they were asked.
39 people · 90 answers
What does the first sixty minutes of your day look like?
Novelist
I get to my desk (in a very small room at the top of the house) at about 10, and fiddle about with the height of the desk and the chair until I’m comfortable.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2017
Songwriter, musician and novelist
As many of you know, I observe specific protocols to open the creative mind – I sit at a desk in my office and write, working exclusively between 9am and 5pm.
Recorded · The Red Hand Files · 2024
Novelist, essayist and critic
Stay in your mental pyjamas all day. […] Work in the morning, a short break for lunch, work in the afternoon and then watch the six o’clock news and then go back to work until bed-time.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
Novelist, short-story writer and translator
When I’m in writing mode for a novel, I get up at four a.m. and work for five to six hours.
Recorded · The Paris Review · 2004
Novelist and editor; Nobel laureate in Literature, 1993
Writing before dawn began as a necessity—I had small children when I first began to write and I needed to use the time before they said, “Mama”—and that was always around five in the…
Recorded · The Paris Review · 1993
When you feel overwhelmed or unfocused, what do you do?
Novelist and essayist
Never stop when you are stuck. You may not be able to solve the problem, but turn aside and write something else. Do not stop altogether.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
Novelist and critic
If you get stuck, get away from your desk.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
Novelist, poet and critic
Don’t sit down in the middle of the woods. If you’re lost in the plot or blocked, retrace your steps to where you went wrong. Then take the other road. And/or change the person.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
Composer, record producer and visual artist
My favorite method is stopping everything for a moment. It’s amazing how difficult I find it these days to simply sit quietly.
Recorded · Telekom Electronic Beats · 2011
Cellist
While I’m on stage, you are all my guests, because that’s sort of the unsaid agreement.
Recorded · On Being (The On Being Project) · 2018
Novelist
Don’t panic.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
What is something everyone in your world agrees about that you think is wrong?
Novelist, poet and essayist
Books aren’t just commodities; the profit motive is often in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism, its power seems inescapable — but then, so did the divine right of kings.
Recorded · ursulakleguin.com (the author's own site) · 2014
Novelist and critic
Some writers claim to extrude a book at an even rate like toothpaste from a tube, or to build a story like a wall, so many feet per day.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2016
Essayist and novelist
Don’t write in public places. In the early 1990s I went to live in Paris.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
Painter, draughtsman, printmaker and photographer
I thought I was a hedonist at the time, but when I look back I was always working. I am always working. I work every day. I never give parties; I never gave them.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2015
Architect; Pritzker Prize laureate, 1995
The modern architecture that I have been weaned on also espouses (clear) function, (exposed) structure, and (raw) material as principles—characteristics that tend to be accessed only from…
Recorded · The Hyatt Foundation / The Pritzker Architecture Prize · 1995
Chef, restaurateur and food activist
I believe that that is a fast-food myth to get us out there buying whatever they’re selling because I know that beans and greens are very, very affordable.
Recorded · NPR (Weekend Edition) · 2021
Everyone here · A–Z
Agnès Varda, Alice Waters, Anne Enright, Annie Proulx, Bong Joon-ho, Brian Eno, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Colm Tóibín, David Hare, David Hockney, Elmore Leonard, Geoff Dyer, Haruki Murakami, Hilary Mantel, J.K. Rowling, Jeanette Winterson, Kazuo Ishiguro, Kurt Vonnegut, Margaret Atwood, Marina Abramović, Neil Gaiman, Nick Cave, Orhan Pamuk, Patti Smith, Paula Scher, Philip Pullman, Richard Ford, Roddy Doyle, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Sarah Waters, Tadao Ando, Toni Morrison, Ursula K. Le Guin, Werner Herzog, Will Self, Wisława Szymborska, Yaa Gyasi, Yo-Yo Ma, Zadie Smith