Author Zadie Smith, writing about writing:
“My god, I was a different person!”—yes, all writers think this, from book to book. I know that this new novel, that I’ve hardly begun, will be shameful and strange to me soon enough. After each book is done, I look forward to hating it (and I never have to wait long); I get a weird, inverse confidence from feeling destroyed, because being destroyed, having to start again, means I have space in front of me, somewhere to go. Think of that revelation Shakespeare put in the mouth of King John: “Now my soul has elbow room!” Fictionally speaking, the nightmare is losing the desire to move.
One of the odd things about writing in public is being able to easily see the thoughts and words of a completely different version of yourself from what feels like a lifetime ago.