Quotes About Writing

I cannot bear natural light when I'm writing.

Smyrna's baby grew up to be a youth of the most unparalleled physical attractiveness. Oh dear, I've written this too many times for you to believe me again.

Writing allows us to listen to the past and speak to the future.

What does writing let you do that you couldn't do otherwise?" I answered, quickly, that it let me live the life I loved and to do odd things—falconry, travel, animal keeping. And, I added, "sometimes get paid for them.

There are books full of great writing that don't have very good stories. Read sometimes for the story... don't be like the book-snobs who won't do that. Read sometimes for the words--the language. Don't be like the play-it-safers who won't do that. But when you find a book that has both a good story and good words, treasure that book.

Writing isn't about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it's about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It's about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy.

Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule.

Write with the door closed, rewrite with the door open.

Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler's heart, kill your darlings.

In many cases when a reader puts a story aside because it 'got boring,' the boredom arose because the writer grew enchanted with his powers of description and lost sight of his priority, which is to keep the ball rolling.

If you expect to succeed as a writer, rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects. If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway.

Writing is not life, but I think that sometimes it can be a way back to life.

If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There's no way around these two things that I'm aware of, no shortcut.

I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out. I'm not proud.

You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.

Writers remember everything...especially the hurts. Strip a writer to the buff, point to the scars, and he'll tell you the story of each small one. From the big ones you get novels. A little talent is a nice thing to have if you want to be a writer, but the only real requirement is the ability to remember the story of every scar. Art consists of the persistence of memory.

I tend to scare myself.

To write is human, to edit is divine.

I have spent a good many years since?too many, I think?being ashamed about what I write. I think I was forty before I realized that almost every writer of fiction or poetry who has ever published a line has been accused by someone of wasting his or her God-given talent. If you write (or paint or dance or sculpt or sing, I suppose), someone will try to make you feel lousy about it, that's all.

Do you drink? Of course,I just said I was a writer.

It starts with this: put your desk in the corner, and every time you sit down there to write, remind yourself why it isn't in the middle of the room. Life isn't a support system for art. It's the other way around.

Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot if difference. They don't have to makes speeches. Just believing is usually enough.

Writing is magic, as much the water of life as any other creative art. The water is free. So drink. Drink and be filled up.

I'm one of those people who doesn't really know what he thinks until he writes it down.