John Nooney

“Thank heaven, then, that a little illusion is left to us, to enable us to be useful and agreeable – that we don’t know exactly what our friends think of us – that the world is not made of looking-glass, to show us just the figure we are making, and just what is going on behind our backs! By the help of dear friendly illusion, we are able to dream that we are charming – and our faces wear a becoming air of self-possession; we are able to dream that other men admire our talents – and our benignity is undisturbed; we are able to dream that we are doing much good – and we do a little.”
― George Eliot, Scenes of Clerical Life

“We read, indeed, that the walls of Jericho fell down before the sound of trumpets,39 but we nowhere hear that those trumpets were hoarse and feeble. Doubtless they were trumpets that gave forth clear ringing tones, and sent a mighty vibration through brick and mortar. But the oratory of the Rev. Amos resembled rather a Belgian railway-horn, which shows praiseworthy intentions inadequately fulfilled.”
― George Eliot, Scenes of Clerical Life

“Who am I, and why? This is the question that writers of personal nonfiction must ask of themselves. Like other forms of art, the writing of memoirs and personal essays should be a journey of discovery. If we believe that we know the answer to the question before we sit down to write, we will learn nothing new about ourselves and, worse, our readers will be denied the opportunity to learn something new about themselves. Readers of your nonfiction should come away knowing more about themselves than they do about you.”
― Sean Prentiss, The Far Edges of the Fourth Genre: An Anthology of Explorations in Creative Nonfiction

“There was a time, when I first found out I was pregnant with twins, that I saw only a state of conflict. When I looked at theater and parenthood, I saw only war, competing loyalties, and I thought my writing life was over. There were times when it felt as though my children were annihilating me (truly you have not lived until you have changed one baby’s diaper while another baby quietly vomits on your shin), and finally I came to the thought, All right, then, annihilate me; that other self was a fiction anyhow. And then I could breathe. I could investigate the pauses. I found that life intruding on writing was, in fact, life. And that, tempting as it may be for a writer who is also a parent, one must not think of life as an intrusion. At the end of the day, writing has very little to do with writing, and much to do with life. And life, by definition, is not an intrusion.”
― Sarah Ruhl, 100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Write: On Umbrellas and Sword Fights, Parades and Dogs, Fire Alarms, Children, and Theater