Quotes About Writing

If anything I try to write something that would be more difficult to film. I tend to see film as competition and would like instead to do what books do best.

Out of silence I begin to hear the voices of characters whispering snippets of a story to me.

Write as much as you can. As fast as you can. Finish your shit. Hit your deadlines. Try very hard not to suck.

Here are the two states in which you may exist: person who writes, or person who does not. If you write: you are a writer. If you do not write: you are not. Aspiring is a meaningless null state that romanticizes Not Writing. It's as ludicrous as saying, "I aspire to pick up that piece of paper that fell on the floor." Either pick it up or don't. I don't want to hear about how your diaper's full. Take it off or stop talking about it.

Writers are made--forged, really, in a kiln of their own madness and insecurities--over the course of many, many moons. The writer you are when you begin is not the same as the writer you become.

Stories are like wine; they need time. So take the time. This isn't a hot dog eating contest. You're not being judged on how much you write but rather, how well you do it. Sure, there's a balance — you have to be generative, have to be swimming forward lest you sink like a stone and find remora fish mating inside your rectum. But generation and creativity should not come at the cost of quality. Give your stories and your career the time and patience it needs.

I think a writer should always be surprised; and the more I write, the more it seems that the language itself, when explored with humility, is always deeper and more accurate than what the author thought he had in mind.

Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book.

I go to school here, same as you,' Han said. Micah blinked at him stupidly, the drink slowing him down. 'You? Do you even know how to read and write? They can't have lowered the standards that much.' 'Well,' Han said, 'they let you in.

Models of style: the swearword, the telegram, the epitaph.

Pero éste es el pacto que haré con la casa de Israel después de aquellos días, dice Jehová: Daré mi ley en su mente, y la escribiré en su corazón;e y yo seré a ellos por Dios, y ellos me serán por pueblo.

Ik ben niet bevreesd, noch voor de ouderdom noch voor de dood, maar berusting is me schrikbeeld. Nooit zou ik aan de oevers waar braafheid en gezapigheid wonen, willen aanleggen. Ik ben nu vijfentachtig, ik schrijf nog steeds en ik zou nog tot liefhebben in staat zijn.

And then Julia's thinking about the internet and blogging; how everyone with a keyboard thinks they can just bang out articles no problem, never mind research or quality control.

He has the good reporter's gift for being in the right place at the right moment, and the structure and rhythm of his sentences show how well he has mastered his medium. After

But even now, a full century after he wrote his first school poem, scratched out in startlingly plain words on onion skin paper with a number two pencil, his heart and soul remain as fresh and brave as ever. Hemingway lives.

Someday I hope to write a book where the royalties will pay for the copies I give away.

The word is my fourth dimension.

Escrevo por não ter nada a fazer no mundo: sobrei e não há lugar para mim na terra dos homens. Escrevo porque sou um desesperado e estou cansado, não suporto mais a rotina de me ser e se não fosse a sempre novidade que é escrever, eu me morreria simbolicamente todos os dias. (A hora da estrela)

I write because I have nothing better to do in this world: I am superfluous and last in the world of men. I write because I am desperate and weary. I can no longer bear the routine of my existence and, were it not for the constant novelty of writing, I should die symbolically each day.

I read what I'd written and thought once again: from what violent chasms is my most intimate intimacy nourished, why does it deny itself so much and flee to the domain of ideas? I feel within me a subterranean violence, a violence that only comes to the surface during the act of writing.

To write you I first cover myself with perfume.

Sometimes writing a single line is enough to save your own heart.

What I really do when I write you is follow myself, and I'm doing it right now: I'm following myself without knowing what it will lead me to. Sometimes following myself is so hard. Because of following something that's still so nebulous. Sometimes I end up stopping.

Everything is heavy with dreams when I paint a cave or write to you about one - out of it comes the clatter of dozens of unfettered horses to trample the shadows with dry hooves, and from the friction of the hooves the rejoicing liberates itself in sparks: here I am, the cave and I, in the time that will rot us.