“You were made and set here to give voice to this, your own astonishment”
Every book has an intrinsic impossibility, which its writer discovers as soon as his first excitement dwindles. The problem is structural; it is insoluble; it is why no one can ever write this book.
From a galvanising 1989 piece by Annie Dillard for the New York Times. A vivid, powerful expression of the art of writing if ever I’ve read one.
The original article is behind the NYT paywall, but Google has a cached version.
(Thanks to T.B. McKenzie for the link.)