“My writing is concerned with the soul, with the unknown forces of the psyche. A British writer said I write under the skin, which I liked. In a spiritual sense, the real life of man is going on inside. It’s not what he says or does, it’s something else. The only way, I think, one can get in touch with that is in dreams, either sleeping or waking…not a trance like stage, but going beyond the conscious. I think maybe that distinguishes the two kinds of writing: there is the muse kind and the journalistic kind. I feel that the stories and subjects “come” to me, because when I try to seek them, they elude me. Consequently, I don’t write for anyone. I write for the soul. If you really tell yourself the truth, you’ve told everyone. This doesn’t come easily at all. It’s all a matter of psychic energy, of getting in touch with what you’re looking for.”
–quote from The James Purdy Society website.