I never get my creativity flowing. I'm a pro, this is how I earn my living. If it don't flow, I don't eat.
If your vulnerability has become hardened, it's very, very difficult to be creative.
An artist doesn't depend upon inspiration or have to have it. An artist doesn't depend on mood, certainly not if you're earning your living with it. One of the definitions of a professional is you can do some writing if you have to, even in the most extreme situations.
Courage can't make you an artist, but without that courage, you won't remain one for long. First is the courage to be alone in the room where you create, and the courage to face that indefinitely, with no one to say if you are any good or not. Then, there is the courage to follow your work wherever it's going to take you. And the courage to fight for your work.
There are writers I know and respect who are very good about what's outside, and not too hot about what's inside.
People are judged continuously everywhere on the most intimate level by the prices on their head. Most of them accept the judgment. It's very hard to have self-respect, or to maintain a state of creativity under these conditions.
I always thought Cyrano De Bergerac was a coward. He could fight a hundred swordsmen, but he was afraid of his nose, and he was afraid of Roxanne. Jam as cowardly as anybody about facing my fears. So, you spend your you years as an artist fighting those hundred people that you happen not to fear. Then you wake up one morning and realize all this time you're afraid of your nose. That's what you're going to have to face for the rest of your life. And you don't feel very courageous. But, if you don't face it, you dry up as an artist.
If I had the money and the drinking capacity, I'd probably live at a roulette table and let my life go to hell.
That's what America's all about, man, if it's about anything. You can choose your own name.
