Michael Ian Black Writing Quotations

By the end of the time I'm writing a book, I'm tearing my hair out and I want to go do stand-up. And then I want to do something else. I don't know why it is true with me that I can't just be satisfied doing the one thing, but I'm constantly flitting from one thing to another.

It's such a deliberate thing to sit down and write a tweet. You're putting yourself out there in a very deliberate way, and over however many tweets, you start to create a character for yourself.

The characters that I have on Twitter have very little resemblance to me, the person who's writing them.

When you're writing something, and you're putting yourself out there, or you're performing and someone comes in and savages that, then of course it feels personal. It doesn't feel like it's just business, because there's no business - it's not like we're conducting business, this anonymous critic and I. It's just that this person is tearing me a new asshole.

My process is surprisingly straightforward. I find myself with little to do over a stretch of time and I say, "I should write children's books today." Then I sit down and write a children's book, and if it takes more than, realistically, three hours, I feel like I've done something wrong.

I think writing for anybody helps you order your life. It helps you arrange your emotions and your thoughts and it helps to provide perspective.

Whatever I write I publish. Because that's where the money is.