WRITING QUOTES II

quotations about writing

Writing quote

Writing is rewriting. It's all about building off of what you have and making it better.

DASHA FAYVINOVA

"9 Reasons Joining A Writing Group Is One Of The Best Ways A Writer Can Grow", Bustle, February 8, 2016


It may appear flippant to tell aspiring writers that if they want to learn to write well, they should begin by writing: something, anything. That's how the best writers started and that's how all of us continue to write.

ALI MADEEH HASHMI

"The art of writing", The News on Sunday, March 11, 2017


A line will take us hours maybe;
Yet if it does not seem a moment's thought,
Our stitching and unstitching has been naught.

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

"Adam's Curse", In the Seven Woods

Tags: William Butler Yeats


After I write, I have nothing to say. The commentary afterwards is superfluous. I write. And that's enough.

YASMINA REZA

"Celebrated Playwright Who Resists Celebrity", The New York Times, May 24, 2011

Tags: Yasmina Reza


I've never been able to write a book without one very strong character in my rucksack.

JOHN LE CARRÉ

interview, The Paris Review, summer 1997

Tags: John le Carré


The good writing of any age has always been the product of someone's neurosis, and we'd have a mighty dull literature if all the writers that came along were a bunch of happy chuckleheads.

WILLIAM STYRON

attributed, Writers at Work

Tags: William Styron


Indeed, being a beginner is very difficult right now. Book publishers are in a crisis, sales are dwindling, and publishing houses are losing money, doing their best to survive. It's a sign of the times, the emergence of new kinds of entertainment -- there's nothing we can do about it. I don't think books will perish for good. They could become less widespread, though, falling even further behind movies and computer games. But we shouldn't be afraid of this, because books will always remain the entertainment of choice for intelligent people, of whom there are still many in this world.

SERGEI LUKYANENKO

interview, The Telegraph, October 5, 2012

Tags: Sergei Lukyanenko


My theory of the uses of fiction is that beneficent fiction calls into full life our total range of imaginative faculties and gives us a heightened sense of our personal, social and human reality.

CHINUA ACHEBE

Hopes and Impediments: Selected Essays

Tags: Chinua Achebe


I was always a believer, even with word processing, that there's something useful about having to retrace your steps from the beginning. And you have to print it out, too--you only get so far if you work by staring at a screen, because the resolution of the paper page is much higher. Your eye actually takes in things on paper more efficiently. I can fiddle around with something on a screen for days and think I'm getting somewhere, and it won't be right. Then I'll print it out and take it to bed, and instantly it's obvious what's bad about it, and I'll cross out, cross out, cross out.

NICHOLSON BAKER

The Paris Review, fall 2011


Writing keeps me at my desk, constantly trying to write a perfect sentence. It is a great privilege to make one's living from writing sentences. The sentence is the greatest invention of civilization. To sit all day long assembling these extraordinary strings of words is a marvelous thing. I couldn't ask for anything better. It's as near to godliness as I can get.... The great thrill is when a sentence that starts out being completely plain suddenly begins to sing, rising far above itself and above any expectation I might have had for it. That's what keeps me going on those dark December days.

JOHN BANVILLE

The Paris Review, spring 2009

Tags: John Banville


In writing, it would help a lot if we had some intermediate punctuation marks to indicate soft questions, soft exclamations, and different inflection in dialogue. But we just don't. And question marks and exclamation marks can jar a reader unnecessarily.

ANNE RICE

interview, The Huffington Post, October 15, 2013

Tags: Anne Rice


Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader, not the fact that it's raining, but the feeling of being rained upon.

E. L. DOCTOROW

attributed, Stein on Writing

Tags: E. L. Doctorow


If you will describe the people--nay, if you will write for the people, you must be one of the people.

WALTER BAGEHOT

Literary Studies

Tags: Walter Bagehot


Here's a news flash--writers are selfish people. Truth is, creative types like me are driven by one impulse--to make up a world in which we get to control everything and everyone. We decide who enters and who exits, what the weather will be, who will hook up with whom, who will win and who will lose. It makes us feel powerful and, in all honesty, has relatively little to do with thinking about what will make anyone else happy.

VICTORIA LAURIE

acknowledgements, What's A Ghoul to Do?

Tags: Victoria Laurie


Starting a new novel is a little like starting a new relationship -- you have to be prepared to commit for at least three years and put up with the domestic tedium as well as the emotional highs!

TOBSHA LEARNER

interview, Australian Women's Weekly, May 11, 2009

Tags: Tobsha Learner


In writing ... remember that the biggest stories are not written about wars, or about politics, or even murders. The biggest stories are written about the things which draw human beings closer together.

SUSAN GLASPELL

Little Masks

Tags: Susan Glaspell


With a practice of writing comes a certain important integrity. A culture filled with bloggers thinks differently about politics or public affairs, if only because more have been forced through the discipline of showing in writing why A leads to B.

LAWRENCE LESSIG

Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy

Tags: Lawrence Lessig


Whoop! 6K words, 21 pages, and 8 miles on the treadmill -- DONE! #ProductiveDay #LetThereBeIceCream

VICTORIA LAURIE

Twitter post, December 21, 2014

Tags: Victoria Laurie


The author should die once he has finished writing. So as not to trouble the path of the text.

UMBERTO ECO

postscript, The Name of the Rose

Tags: Umberto Eco


Sex has to be good for both partners. That is also the key to writing both fiction and nonfiction. It has to be a good experience for both partners, the writer and the reader, and it is a source of distress to me to observe how frequently writers ignore the pleasure of their partners.

SOL STEIN

Stein on Writing