quotations about writing
The humorous story is told gravely; the teller does his best to conceal the fact that he even dimly suspects that there is anything funny about it.
MARK TWAIN
"How to Tell a Story"
I spend a lot of time loathing the sentences that I put down on the page. Once I'm past that phase, it doesn't really matter what the routine is (coffee shop, someone else's house, my dining room table), I'm pretty fast. I go back to the start of whatever I'm working on, every half hour or so, and revise my way back to where I left off. I have my headphones on, I'm checking email, I look at Twitter and Tumblr, and drink a lot of coffee. I need a lot of distraction to work.
KELLY LINK
interview, Electric Lit, February 6, 2015
I truly believe that writing is a continuum--so the different genres and forms are simply stops along the same continuum. Different ideas that need to be expressed sometimes require different forms for the ideas to float better.
CHRIS ABANI
interview, UTNE Reader, June 2010
A serious writer is not to be confused with a solemn writer. A serious writer may be a hawk or a buzzard or even a popinjay, but a solemn writer is always a bloody owl.
ERNEST HEMINGWAY
Death in the Afternoon
I don't actually talk about my books much, because I find if I talk about them I don't want to write them anymore. I write to find out what happens. You know how you read a book? That's what I'm doing except I'm just doing it a lot slower because it takes a lot longer to do.
CHARLES DE LINT
"Music and Myth: A Conversation with Charles de Lint", The Internet Review of Science Fiction
There are two kinds of characters in all fiction, the born and the synthetic. If the writer has to ask himself questions -- is he tall, is he short? -- he had better quit.
REX STOUT
The New York Times, November 15, 1953
I think it's bad to talk about one's present work, for it spoils something at the root of the creative act. It discharges the tension.
NORMAN MAILER
attributed, The Writer's Quotation Book
Writing is always a rough translation from wordlessness into words.
CHARLES SIMIC
attributed, Stealing Glimpses: Of Poetry, Poets, and Things in Between
I have no pleasure in writing myself--none, in the mere act--though all pleasure in the sense of fulfilling a duty, whence, if I have done my real best, judge how heart-breaking a matter must it be to be pronounced a poor creature by critic this and acquaintance the other.
ROBERT BROWNING
letter to Elizabeth Barrett, March 12, 1845
Rejection has value. It teaches us when our work or our skillset is not good enough and must be made better. This is a powerful revelation, like the burning UFO wheel seen by the prophet Ezekiel, or like the McRib sandwich shaped like the Virgin Mary seen by the prophet Steve Jenkins. Rejection refines us. Those who fall prey to its enervating soul-sucking tentacles are doomed. Those who persist past it are survivors. Best ask yourself the question: what kind of writer are you? The kind who survives? Or the kind who gets asphyxiated by the tentacles of woe?
CHUCK WENDIG
"25 Things Writers Should Know About Rejection", Terrible Minds
As the deadline looms, my quality of writing is in danger of declining all because I just had to check my email.
GERI SPIELER
"The Dangers of Distracted Writing", Huffington Post, February 28, 2016
In writing, as in speaking, less is more. When you are editing -- which should be immediately after you finish the writing for one session and again at least a day or more after you finished it -- look over the piece with a critical eye and cut, cut, cut.
ALI MADEEH HASHMI
"The art of writing", The News on Sunday, March 11, 2017
Few sensible authors are happy discussing the creative process -- it is, after all, black magic, and may lose its power if we look that particular gift horse too closely in the mouth.
EDWARD ALBEE
introduction, Three Tall Women
My method is to take the utmost trouble to find the right thing to say, and then to say it with the utmost levity.
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
Answers to Nine Questions
Every character is an extension of the author's own personality.
EDWARD ALBEE
The New York Times, September 18, 1966
At one time I used to keep notebooks with outlines for stories. But I found doing this somehow deadened the idea in my imagination. If the notion is good enough, if it truly belongs to you, then you can't forget it--it will haunt you till it's written.
TRUMAN CAPOTE
The Paris Review, spring-summer 1957
You want to be a writer? Good for you. So does that guy. And that girl. And him. And her. And that old dude. And that young broad. And your neighbor. And your mailman. And that Chihuahua. And that copy machine. Ahead of you is an ocean of wannabe ink slaves and word earners. I don't say this to daunt you. Or to be dismissive. But you have to differentiate yourself, and the way you do that is by doing rather than pretending.
CHUCK WENDIG
The Kick-Ass Writer
Sometimes I pick up a book and I say: Well, so you've written it first, have you? Good for you. O.K., then I won't have to write it.
DORIS LESSING
The Golden Notebook
Writing in the first person can be claustrophobic--everything that happens in the book is notionally filtered through the narrator, and one can long for the fresh air of another perspective. One can luxuriate in the peculiar world of a character, but there are limitations. Ironizing that person's experience is difficult. You need perhaps a candid old friend of the narrator who can tell a few truths the narrator prefers to ignore.
ALAN HOLLINGHURST
The Paris Review, winter 2011
The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies.
RAY BRADBURY
Fahrenheit 451