quotations about writing
The privilege of being a writer is that you have this opportunity to slow down and to consider things.
CHRIS ABANI
interview, UTNE Reader, June 2010
Writing books is the closest men ever come to childbearing.
NORMAN MAILER
The New York Times Book Review, September 17, 1965
We all often feel like we are pulling teeth, even those writers whose prose ends up being the most natural and fluid. The right words and sentences just do not come pouring out like ticker tape most of the time.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
I wish my prose to be transparent--I don't want the reader to stumble over me; I want him to look through what I'm saying to what I'm describing. I don't want him ever to say, Oh, goodness, how nicely written this is. That would be a failure.
V. S. NAIPAUL
The Paris Review, fall 1998
The final lesson a writer learns is that everything can nourish the writer. The dictionary, a new word, a voyage, an encounter, a talk on the street, a book, a phrase learned.
ANAÏS NIN
attributed, French Writers of the Past
I tend to write things seven times before I show them to my editor. I write them seven times, then I take them on tour, read them like a dozen times on tour, then go back to the room and rewrite, read and rewrite, and I try to learn as much as I can on my own before I show it to my editor at The New Yorker. I would never show him a first draft, because then he's really going to be sick of it by the twelfth draft.
DAVID SEDARIS
Oasis Magazine, June 2008
Write only of what is important and eternal.
ANTON CHEKHOV
The Seagull
If there is a special Hell for writers it would be in the forced contemplation of their own works.
JOHN DOS PASSOS
New York Times, October 25, 1959
There are two men inside the artist, the poet and the craftsman. One is born a poet. One becomes a craftsman.
EMILE ZOLA
letter to Cezanne
Write as the wind blows and command all words like an army!
HILAIRE BELLOC
The Path to Rome
Writing is a part of healing, of digging into society.
KHALED KHALIFA
"Syrian novelist Khaled Khalifa tells the stories of a bleeding, beautiful country", Syria Direct, March 23, 2017
I've come to believe that a huge part of getting better at writing is forcing yourself to see the things that have been in the corner of your eye all along. That means writing stories that include characters from other cultures and backgrounds--but also, being more open to other viewpoints in general. It also means interrogating all of your other lazy ideas and drilling into all of the "of courses" that you let yourself get away with.
CHARLIE JANE ANDERS
"The Single Most Important Thing You Can Do To Make Your Writing More Awesome", Gizmodo, February 25, 2016
Almost every author I have met who has started a novel that is not yet finished is making the same mistake: They are all bogged down at around chapter 4 or 5. Why? Because they are editing everything as they go. Dotting every T, crossing every 'i' and writing and re-writing every sentence until it is perfect. There are a few theories as to why you just can't do this but let me just be clear up front: YOU CAN'T DO THIS!
DAVID CHISLETT
"Editing Is Not Writing", Books LIVE, February 12, 2016
No music. No rituals. At home I write in my office or on the laptop in the kitchen where our puppy likes to sleep, and I love his company. But I've trained myself to be able to work anywhere, and I write on trains, planes, in automobiles (if I'm not the driver), airports, hotel rooms. I travel often. If I couldn't write wherever I was I would get little done. I also can write in short bursts. Fifteen minutes are enough to move a story forward.
GAIL CARSON LEVINE
interview, Bookshop Talk, September 22, 2011
After a while the business end of writing takes too much of the writing time. Better to pay someone ten percent and find that you're still more than ten percent ahead in the end. Which is true. My present agent says that he always feels that a good agent during the course of a year should earn back for his client at least the ten percent he takes by way of commission, so the client's really nothing out. And what he should ideally do is make him more money than the ten percent.
ROGER ZELAZNY
interview, Phlogiston, 1995
This is a slow business to have success in. There are exceptions, but for the most part it's kind of like the last writer standing.... I've got gray. I've got plenty of gray. I'm creating a career slowly, like a coral reef.
ROBERT REED
Lincoln Journal Star, January 11, 2004
I'm not interested in writing for adults. I like them as people! I don't like the way they publish books in that world. Nothing ever gets a chance.
JOHN GREEN
Huffington Post, October 12, 2012
My job is not to try to give readers what they want but to try to make readers want what I give.
CHINA MIÉVILLE
The Guardian, September 20, 2012
My gratitude for good writing is unbounded; I'm grateful for it the way I'm grateful for the ocean.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
I consider a story merely as a frame on which to stretch my materials.
WASHINGTON IRVING
introduction, Tales of a Traveler