Quote

When I'm writing flawed characters, I just think about my own flaws.

Jacqueline Woodson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jacqueline Woodson
Age: 61
Born: 1963
Born: February 12
Novelist
Poet
Writer
Columbus
Ohio
Writing
Think
Thinking
Flawed
Flaws
Characters
Character

More quotes by Jacqueline Woodson

Image
When you think of how a child experiences a series of events, it feels, for so long, like she's looking at everything from behind this glass and it's obscured.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
To watch your home change in front of you is surprising. But at the same time, going someplace like Mississippi, makes me appreciate even this.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I think people are sometime reluctant to read outside of their own race. This is heartbreaking.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I'm not afraid of silence. You know, I'm not afraid to sit in a room and have the conversation drop into silence. I think that's a very southern thing.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
Yes, writing is not easy. But can any writer imagine NOT writing?
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
In all your getting, get understanding.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
There is so much work left to be done in the world and for me, I am hoping to make the change I can and do the work I need to do through this gift I've been given.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I've learned a lot as a writer about poetry.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I think it's important to remember that writing is a gift and our stories are gifts to ourselves and to the world and sometimes giving isn't always the easiest thing to do but it comes back.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I've learned about marrying poetry and prose and making both accessible.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I think people need to remember that a book isn't done after a few rewrites and a publisher isn't going to buy an 'undone' book so the hard part is making it a book that at least ten other people want to pay for to read.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
The Bible is big in the religion, treating people as you want to be treated.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
Everything I write, I read out loud. It has to sound a certain way. It has to look a certain way on the page.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I actually don't think of whiteness and heterosexuality as 'the norm'. Maybe there are people who still do but none of them are close friends of mine.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I'm always wondering if he'll return. Sometimes I pray that he doesn't. And sometimes I hope he will. I wish on falling stars and eyelashes. Absence isn't solid the way death is. It's fluid, like language. And it hurts so much...so, so much.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
There's me in every character I put on the pages.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
Maybe this was our last summer as best friends. I feel like something's going to change now and I'm not going to be able to change it back. —Margaret
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
Lately, I'd been feeling like I was standing outside watching everything and everybody. Wishing I could take the part of me that was over there and the part of me that was over here and push them together—make myself into one whole person like everybody else.
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
I have met women who don't have close women friends, and I've always been like, How could that possibly be?
Jacqueline Woodson
Image
The empty swing set reminds us of this-- that bad won't be bad forever, and what is good can sometimes last a long, long time.
Jacqueline Woodson