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About this quote

What does it mean?
Writers can lose agency to their own characters or stories.
In plain terms
Writers feel like they are being written by their work.
What can you take from it?
Stories can control the writer.

Where it applies

  • discussing writing
  • creative burnout
  • artistic process

Putting it to work

  • take breaks
  • maintain boundaries
  • reclaim control

Questions to consider

  • Who writes whom?
  • Does art consume you?

Another view

Writers usually choose when to stop.

More from David Mitchell

  1. The most malicious god is the god of the counted chicken.

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  2. Whoever dies with the most stuff wins.

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  3. I have always preferred maps to books. They don't answer you back.

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