quotations about writing
Writing a killer first line to a novel is an art form in which there are a few masters and a great many apprentices.
CHUCK WENDIG
"25 Things to Know about Writing the First Chapter of Your Novel", Terrible Minds
I turn sentences around. That's my life. I write a sentence and then I turn it around. Then I look at it and turn it around again.
PHILIP ROTH
Ghost Writer
Write. Don't talk about writing. Don't tell me about your wonderful story ideas. Don't give me a bunch of "somedays." Plant your ass and scribble, type, keyboard. If you have any talent at all, it will leak out despite your failure to pay attention in English.
GLEN COOK
interview, SF Site, September 2005
I've got splinters in my nose from the best publishing doors in town.
RITA MAE BROWN
interview, Time, March 18, 2008
It's a principle of mine to come into the story as late as possible, and to tell it as fast as you can.
JOHN LE CARRÉ
interview, The Paris Review, summer 1997
Much modern prose is praised for its terseness, its scrupulous avoidance of curlicue, etcetera. But I don't feel the deeper rhythm there. I don't think these writers are being terse out of choice. I think they are being terse because it's the only way they can write.
MARTIN AMIS
The Paris Review, spring 1998
The most common human act that writing a novel resembles is lying. The working novelist lies daily, very complexly, and at great length.
WILLIAM GIBSON
Twitter post, May 31, 2009
However much the writer might long to be, in his work, simple, honest, and straightforward, these virtues are no longer available to him. He discovers that in being simple, honest, and straightforward, nothing much happens: he speaks the speakable, whereas what we are looking for is the as-yet unspeakable, the as-yet unspoken.
DONALD BARTHELME
"Not-Knowing"
In the mental disturbance and effort of writing, what sustains you is the certainty that on every page there is something left unsaid.
CESARE PAVESE
This Business of Living, May 4, 1942
I couldn't imagine, and I don't say this with any pride, but I really couldn't imagine writing without a desperate deadline.
HUNTER S. THOMPSON
The Paris Review, fall 2000
[Rejection] made me quit writing once. For six months. I started up again when my then seven-year-old son asked me to start writing again because I was too grumpy when I wasn't writing.
KIRBY LARSON
interview, Author Turf, March 6, 2014
I don't think I'm cut out for a job where you have to look professionally tidy. I prefer working in my pajamas and taking showers after lunch.
KELLY LINK
"Words by Flashlight", Sybil's Garage, June 7, 2006
All stories are about wolves. All worth repeating, that is. Anything else is sentimental drivel.
MARGARET ATWOOD
The Blind Assassin
All good writing leaves something unexpressed.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
If I cannot be myself in what I write, then the whole is nothing but lies and humbug.
HENRIK IBSEN
letter to Björnstjerne Björnson, September 12, 1865
The publishers want series, obviously. Originally, they wanted me to do the Garrett series along with another similar series, so it would be one book every six months. Eventually I'd just do the outlines and they'd get some poor unknown author to flesh out the stories. That's why you see so many books by a famous author and an unknown. You can make half the money basically by selling your name. The thing is, once your name is on enough bad books, maybe it isn't worth all that much any more.
GLEN COOK
interview, Quantum Muse
The same common-sense which makes an author write good things, makes him dread they are not good enough to deserve reading.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Works of the Mind", Les Caractères
In utter loneliness a writer tries to explain the inexplicable.
JOHN STEINBECK
New York Times, June 2, 1969
I can't write five words but that I change seven.
DOROTHY PARKER
The Paris Review, summer 1956
Journalism is a good place for any writer to start -- the retailing of fact is always a useful trade and can it help you learn to appreciate the declarative sentence. A young writer is easily tempted by the allusive and ethereal and ironic and reflective, but the declarative is at the bottom of most good writing.
GARRISON KEILLOR
"Post to the Host", July 2005