WRITING QUOTES XXV

quotations about writing

I hate writing, I love having written.

DOROTHY PARKER

attributed, Rhymes with Vain


I can't understand why a person will take a year or two to write a novel when he can easily buy one for a few dollars.

FRED ALLEN

attributed, Books: Their History, Art, Power, Glory, Infamy and Suffering According to Their Creators, Friends and Enemies

Tags: Fred Allen


I always have the feeling that I'm never going to be able to write anything funny again. That's why I keep writing funny things. I have to prove to myself that I'm wrong.

RITA RUDNER

interview, Huffington Post, March 18, 2013

Tags: Rita Rudner


Fiction writers, at least in their braver moments, do desire the truth: to know it, speak it, serve it. But they go about it in a peculiar and devious way, which consists in inventing persons, places, and events which never did and never will exist or occur, and telling about these fictions in detail and at length and with a great deal of emotion, and then when they are done writing down this pack of lies, they say, There! That's the truth!

URSULA K. LE GUIN

introduction, The Left Hand of Darkness

Tags: Ursula K. Le Guin


Failure has been my best friend as a writer. It tests you, to see if you have what it takes to see it through.

MARKUS ZUSAK

"Why I Write", The Guardian, March 28, 2008


As things stand now, I am going to be a writer. I'm not sure that I'm going to be a good one or even a self-supporting one, but until the dark thumb of fate presses me to the dust and says "you are nothing," I will be a writer.

HUNTER S. THOMPSON

Gonzo


An author in his book must be like God in the universe, present everywhere and visible nowhere.

GUSTAVE FLAUBERT

letter to Madame Louise Colet, December 9, 1852

Tags: Gustave Flaubert


Writing is a job, a talent, but it's also the place to go in your head. It is the imaginary friend you drink your tea with in the afternoon.

ANN PATCHETT

Truth and Beauty

Tags: Ann Patchett


Without a pen in my hand I can't think.

JOHN LE CARRÉ

interview, The Paris Review, summer 1997

Tags: John le Carré


Why do you keep reading a book? Usually to find out what happens. Why do you give up and stop reading it? There may be lots of reasons. But often the answer is you don't care what happens. So what makes the difference between caring and not caring? The author's cruelty. And the reader's sympathy ... it takes a mean author to write a good story.

GAIL CARSON LEVINE

Writing Magic

Tags: Gail Carson Levine


What you're trying to do when you write is to crowd the reader out of his own space and occupy it with yours, in a good cause. You're trying to take over his sensibility and deliver an experience that moves from mere information.

ROBERT STONE

The Paris Review, winter 1985

Tags: Robert Stone


What I like to do is write the story, see where it takes me -- and then check out the details I don't know. When I first started writing, there were a lot of things about the world that I understood but didn't have the vocabulary for -- and even more things that I just had no idea about. For instance, do you know all the parts of a door frame? Or what flowers bloom in the spring in alpine climates? There's a surprising amount of homework involved in writing a book.

PATRICIA BRIGGS

interview, Bitten by Books, March 30, 2010


Well, there are certain stock words that I have found myself using a great deal. When I become aware of them, it is an alarm signal meaning I am falling back on something that has served in the past--it is a sign of not thinking at the present moment, not that there is anything intrinsically bad about certain words or phrases.

JOHN ASHBERY

interview, The Paris Review, winter 1983

Tags: John Ashbery


The moment comes when a character does or says something you hadn't thought about. At that moment he's alive and you leave it to him.

GRAHAM GREENE

New York Times, October 9, 1985


Someone watches over us when we write. Mother. Teacher. Shakespeare. God.

MARTIN AMIS

London Fields

Tags: Martin Amis


Of all that is written I love only what a man has written with his blood. Write with blood, and you will find that blood is spirit.

FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE

Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Tags: Friedrich Nietzsche


It's not the word made flesh we want in writing, in poetry and fiction, but the flesh made word.

WILLIAM H. GASS

On Being Blue


Gotta have a head like a wrecking ball, a spirit like one of them punching clown dummies that always weeble-wobbles back up to standing. This takes time. Stories need to find the right home, the right audience. Stick with it. Quitting is for sad pandas.

CHUCK WENDIG

250 Things You Should Know About Writing

Tags: Chuck Wendig


Go to any lengths to avoid preachiness! If you have to choose between the message and the story, always choose the story.

ELIZABETH ZELVIN

interview, The Fix

Tags: Elizabeth Zelvin


All stories are about wolves. All worth repeating, that is. Anything else is sentimental drivel.

MARGARET ATWOOD

The Blind Assassin

Tags: Margaret Atwood