Quotes About Writing

The challenge in writing a show that's about people and their flaws is that it can easily tip over - okay, I'll sometimes watch something, and there will be characters that are written in a way that I'll know that the writer just hates human beings. They're expressing this misanthropic point of view with these detestable characters.

It's a good tip for writers, that - write with an actor in mind. Even if you have no hope of getting John Cleese, it's much better to write it with him in mind because you might find someone else to do that stuff; it really helps.

Sometimes it's hard to start, but once it gets going, once you reach the tipping point - usually between chapter seven and nine - then it's like hanging onto a large snowball as it hurtles downhill.

Write every day; never give up; it's supposed to be difficult; try to find some pleasure and reward in the act of writing, because you can't look for praise from editors, readers, or critics. In other words, tips that are much easier to give than to take.

My problem with mechanical pencils is that I break the lead tips constantly.

Writing tips are like mini skirts. Sometimes they fit perfectly, sometimes they make you cry, and sometimes you can reuse the material and sew yourself a pillow or something.

I'm afraid there are no magical tips. There is no secret. Writing is all about telling stories as well as you can.

The building of the architecture of a novel - the craft of it - is something I never tire of.

You're miserable, edgy and tired. You're in the perfect mood for journalism.

I just am so tired of really badly written women. It's so boring.

Critics will tell you the 'meet cute' is a tired old writing cliche, but the thing is, cliche's work - because they ring true with the reader.

So: we're all tired. Now what? Manuscripts written in Club Med?

I've just finished my 20th book this past year and I'm working on my 21st book about the Middle East right now that I'll finish this year. And I get up early in the morning and when I get tired of the computer and tired of doing research, I walk 20 steps out to my woodshop and I either build furniture or paint paintings. I'm an artist too.

I'm a method writer. In order to write about the emotion, I have to experience it. I get physically tired and exhausted, devoting hours and hours and hours to it.

The best thing that ever happened to me is that nothing happened in writing. I ended up working for engineering companies, and that's where I found my material, in the everyday struggle between capitalism and grace. Being broke and tired, you don't come home your best self.

It's so easy to use tired, shopworn figures of speech. I love using long, fancy words but have learned - mostly from writing my biography of Winston Churchill - that short, strong words work better. I am ever-vigilant against the passive and against jargon, both of which are so insidious.

I had to audition as an actor, and I got so tired of doing the same monologues over and over, so I started writing my own, and then I started selling them to other actors.

People may get tired of hearing from me, but I don't think I'll ever run out of things that I want to write about.

I love drafting like I love eating ice cream or having sex; I love revising like I love doing logic puzzles; I love line-editing like I love perfectly organizing a bookshelf; I hate reviewing copyedits and the second round of proofreading because, by then, I'm getting pretty tired of my own words. They all have their own challenges, though.

TV's not the problem, and I'm tired of it being posed as this antithesis to creativity and productivity. If TV's getting in your way of writing a book, then you don't want to write a book bad enough.

I used to write out of angst. My writing was quite miserable, quite angry, even when it was funny. It was based on this sadness and tired emotional disdain for the world.

'Tis pleasant, sure, to see one's name in print. A book's a book, although there's nothing in 't.

A lot of times, somebody will say something and it will give you a good title. So you carry a pencil with you and jot that down. You don't just write a song right quick, though. You fool around and work with it. You have to keep going over and over it and see if you can't write a song that means something.

Jigsaw Lady is the working title of a science fiction novel I've had in my head for darn near 15 years. I think I'll start work on it next year (in all my spare time) but I'd like to get it finished some day.