Quotes About Writing

De schrijvers is natuurlijk de valsspeler bij uitstek. Hij maakt gebruik van middelen die anderen niet hebben. Zijn leven is een laboratorium waarin experimenten worden uitgevoerd ten behoeve van het vertellen van verhalen. Wat hem ook overkomt, hij kan altijd afstand nemen van zijn rampen, zijn tragedies, zijn mislukkingen, door erover te vertellen. Dat kunnen anderen niet altijd, niet op die manier, en dat maakt hem een valsspeler.

De schrijver is natuurlijk de valsspeler bij uitstek. Hij maakt gebruik van middelen die anderen niet hebben. Zijn leven is een laboratorium waarin experimenten worden uitgevoerd ten behoeve van het vertellen van verhalen. Wat hem ook overkomt, hij kan altijd afstand nemen van zijn rampen, zijn tragedies, zijn mislukkingen, door erover te vertellen. Dat kunnen anderen niet altijd, niet op die manier, en dat maakt hem een valsspeler.

An author should never turn down the opportunity for a new experience

This book was written on an Archives III microcomputer with WordStar software and sent from Colombo to New York on one five-inch diskette. Last-minute corrections were transmitted through the Padukka Earth Station and the Indian Ocean Intelsat V.

He seems to have declared war on the King's English as well as on the English king.

When a man writes on a wall, his instinct leads him to write above the level of his own eyes.

It is a pity he did not write in pencil. As you have no doubt frequently observed, the impression usually goes through -- a fact which has dissolved many a happy marriage.

Men of character always differentiate their long letters, however illegibly they may write. - Sherlock Holmes

Seclusion I can understand; but why print? Printing is a clumsy process. Why not write? What would it suggest, Watson?

jacket. It was this sketch-book, which was as dilapidated

Grace Paley once described the male-female writer phenomenon to me by saying, "Women have always done men the favor of reading their work, but the men have not returned the favor.

I loathe writing autobiographical material because if it's dull no-one should have to read it anyway, and if it's interesting I should be using it for a story.

If I am spared," he always said to Constance, "I will write the book myself. If not, see that my notes are entrusted to some worthy cynic who will not be too concerned with the truth.

I remember coming home from school with friends who were startled at the percussive sound of my parents' typewriters both going at once, pounding away in different rooms.

It is my hope to, one day, share my love for HPL with the world.

The road to hell is very likely paved with my notes for stories and books and articles.

Detesto scrivere pezzi autobiografici: se il materiale è noioso non bisognerebbe infliggerlo a nessuno, e se è interessante dovrei usarlo per un racconto.

It is most agreeable to be a writer of fiction for several reasons–one of the most important being, of course that you can persuade people that it is really work if you look haggard enough–but perhaps the most useful thing about being a writer of fiction is that nothing is ever wasted; all experience is good for something; you tend to see everything as a potential structure of words.

It is almost silly to say that no one will read a story which does not interest him. Yet many writers forget it. They write a story which interests them, forgetting that the particular emotional investment they brought to the incident had never been communicated to the reader because, writing the story, they wrote down only what happened and not what was felt.

I think it cannot be too firmly emphasized that in the writing of any kind of fiction no scene and no character can be allowed to wander off by itself; there must be some furthering of the story in every sentence, and even the most fleeting background characters must partake of the story in some way; they must be characters peculiar to this story and no other.

No soporto escribir temas autobiográficos porque si son aburridos, nadie debería leerlos, y si son interesnates, debería usarlos en una historia.

I weep to think of all the tricks you've played on me since I've had you for a husband …and now, as if all that weren't enough, you decide to become a circus clown. A penny-a-liner! And to think there are even worse fools than you who will pay to read what you write!

I don't know how it is with other writers, but I've been treated like the lowest of the low.

And you sit in Yehupetz without a word! There's no excuse. If you're dead, the least you could do is let me know, and if you're alive, all the more reason to write.