Quotes About Writing

In order to write the book you want to write, in the end you have to become the person you need to become to write that book.

Substitute "damn" every time you're inclined to write "very"; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.

Very often we write down a sentence too early, then another too late; what we have to do is write it down at the proper time, otherwise it's lost.

You don't have to suffer to be a poet; adolescence is enough suffering for anyone.

Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity.

The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it.

The first thing you have to know about writing is that it is something you must do everyday. There are two reasons for this rule: Getting the work done and connecting with your unconscious mind.

No academic ever expects to be taken seriously by more than three other people, because really, we write for three people in our field.

Freedom is...the right to write the wrong words.

It takes writing a billion bad words before you get to the good ones.

The purpose of literature is to turn blood into ink.

If you are a writer you locate yourself behind a wall of silence and no matter what you are doing, driving a car or walking or doing housework you can still be writing, because you have that space.

There is something magical about putting a problem in writing. It is almost as though by writing about what is wrong, you start to discover new ways of making it right.

Read. Read 1000 pages for every 1 page that you write.

If I had more time I would write a shorter letter.

Be kind and considerate with your criticism... It's just as hard to write a bad book as it is to write a good book.

When I'm writing, I know I'm doing the thing I was born to do.

To withdraw myself from myself has ever been my sole, my entire, my sincere motive in scribbling at all.

Writing is a craft not an art.

The true writer, the born writer, will scribble words on scraps of litter, the back of a bus tickets, on the wall of a cell.

Given a choice of weapons with you sir, I should choose grammar.

I would advise anyone who aspires to a writing career that before developing his talent he would be wise to develop a thick hide.

To anyone who knows a writer, never underestimate the power of your encouragement.

I want to write, but more than that, I want to bring out all kinds of things that lie buried deep in my heart.