It was either this quote or, “I would rather have birds than airplanes.”

Here’s the funny story of how William Faulkner got into writing, in his own words:

(If you don’t want to read it, go here and you can find the audio clip of Mr. Faulkner telling below story to a Virginia classroom.)

Unidentified participant: Sir, when you started to write, did you write to—to say something to other people or did you write mostly for your own satisfaction?

William Faulkner: Because it was fun. I became a writer by a chance. I’ve told this story before, some of you may have heard it. I was running whiskey for a New Orleans bootlegger back in Prohibition days, and I met Sherwood Anderson, and I liked him from the first. We would meet in the afternoons, and we would walk around New Orleans, and—and he would talk and I would listen. Then in the evening, we would meet, and we’d sit somewhere and drink, and he would talk and I would listen.

In the morning, he would be in seclusion working, and that went on day after day, and I thought that if that was what a writer’s life was, that would be the life for me, [audience laughter] and so I wrote a book and—and after the first day or two, I found out that writing was fun.

It was just about the nicest thing anybody could do, and I was having so much fun at it that I even forgot about Mr. Anderson.

I hadn’t seen him in, oh, several weeks, and I met Mrs. Anderson on the street, and she said, “We haven’t seen you in some time.”

I said, “Yes’m, I’m writing a book.”

So I saw her again on the street, and she said, “I told Sherwood you were writing a book, and Sherwood said, ‘My God,’” [audience laughter] and I saw her later on.

She said, “How’s the book getting along?” I said, “I’m just about to finish it.”

And she said, “Do you want Sherwood to read it?”

I hadn’t thought about anybody reading the thing because it was fun, and I said, “Yes’m, I don’t mind if he wants to,” so she told him about it.

I saw her again, and she says, “Sherwood says if he don’t have to read it, he’ll make a trade with you. If he don’t have to read it, he’ll tell his publisher to take it.”

So I said, “Done.” [audience laughter]

And so he told Mr. Liveright to take it, and that’s how I got published. [audience laughter] But by that time, I’d found out that—that writing was fun to do, and that that was simply my cup of tea, and I’ve been at it since, ever since.

…by Don Novello