Quotes About Writing

And every writer cherishes the dream of setting the young on fire, even if only by a cigarette butt tossed casually over the shoulder, and when we meet young people who say that they were inspired by what we said to rush off and read the books we were talking about, we can congratulate ourselves for all those guilty hours when, the last two left after a long lunch, we went on arguing about everything we knew.

Any pipsqueak can roar like a lion on paper, because grand words cost little, whereas delicacy—the delicacy of Chopin for example, persevering to the extreme, tense, elaborate—requires effort and character. —WITOLD GOMBROWICZ,

It is isn't easy to make someone who hasn't experienced it understand what it feels like, this martyrdom of being judged, devalued, disqualified, and misrepresented by journalists writing in haste who are bored by reading and who, for that matter, hardly ever read anything anyway. —WITOLD GOMBROWICZ,

Bizarrely, I am convinced that a writer incapable of talking about himself is not a complete writer. —WITOLD GOMBROWICZ,

To put it briefly, the secret is to put it briefly. But you always think that's what you're doing, until experience teaches you that you aren't being brief enough.

To write is to pour one's innermost self passionately upon the tempting paper, at such frantic speed that sometimes one's hand struggles and rebels, overdriven by the impatient god which guides it - and to find, next day, in place of the golden bough that bloomed miraculously in that dazzling hour, a withered bramble and a stunted flower.

The writer who loses his self-doubt, who gives way as he grows old to a sudden euphoria, to prolixity, should stop writing immediately: the time has come for him to lay aside his pen.

To write sincerely, almost sincerely! I hope it may bring me relief, that sort of interior silence which follows a sudden utterance, a confession.

One can't write of love while making love.

Es horrible pensar, como me pasa cada vez que empiezo un libro, que ya no tengo, que nunca he tenido talento alguno.

car écrire ne conduit qu'à écrire.

When does one stop writing? . . . I thought in the past that the work of writing was like other tasks; the tool is laid down and one cries out in delight: 'Finished!' and you clap your hands, from where there rain down grains of sand that first one believed to be precious . . . It is then that you read in the outlines traced by the grains of sand the words: 'To be continued . . .

It takes it out of you, writing with heart. And it was just for me really. Sort of a confirmation to myself that my inner diva can still make love to the keyboard when she's in the mood. I have to keep her roped and gagged when I'm writing for the newspapers. They don't like her at all. They don't want love. They want a quick tryst in a motel room that's forgotten in a few hours.

I always drink at lunchtime. It helps my imagination.

??????? ???? ?????? ??? ?????? ??? ????, ????, ??? ? ???? (The path of writing is crooked and straight)

The track of writing is straight and crooked.

Und ganz am Ende, in den freien Raum unter dem letzten Marchen, hatte sie mit ihrer windschiefen Schrift geschrieben: Und sie lebten glucklich und zufrieden. Paul und Ida auch.

Literature boils with the madcap careers of writers brought to the edge by the demands of living on their nerves, wringing out their memories and their nightmares to extract meaning, truth, beauty.

Als das Grundgesetz entstandt, zitterte förmlich der Boden, auf dem es geschrieben wurde.

Veertien Dertien had men net zo goed kunnen overslaan, omdat er alleen maar onzin in staat. Ik heb helemaal geen zoon, laat staan dat hij een rondleiding over mij zou presenteren in zaal Concordia. Eigenlijk had men één tot en met twaalf net zo goed kunnen overslaan omdat immers alles onzin is. Ik kan het weten, ik schrijf al die bullshit.

Writing is good, thinking is better. Cleverness is good, patience is better.

I regard the writing of humor as a supreme artistic challenge.

Income tax returns are the most imaginative fiction being written today.

I try to write a certain amount each day, five days a week. A rule sometimes broken is better than no rule.