Quotes About Writing

The things I discovered when writing 'Line of Duty' were the tools you have available to write a thriller.

The fact that I had spent so many years doing media criticism and thinking really seriously about theme and structure did definitely help. Doing that for several years indirectly built a lot of tools that I would end up using when writing my own fiction.

Almost all novels are improved by cutting from the top. On their first pages, authors parade those favourite effects which disgust the impartial reader.

With 'Slave Ambient', I was writing things on top of loops. Now I really get the structure of the song down, but I leave room for improvisation in the studio.

Sometimes when I find myself very irritated about a topic, I know it's my next book.

I used to write jokes with friends. We'd pick a topic and then think out loud, brainstorm.

One danger, when you're writing lots of quick, opinionated blog items about the latest developments, is that you never get around to stating fully, in one place, what you think about a particular topic.

I want the 'Book of Basketball' to do well if only so I can shop an absolutely ridiculous topic for my next book: like, a book about basketball cards, or an unauthorized biography of A. J. Daulerio.

Writing an essay is like a school assignment: I have my topic, I organize my thoughts, and I write it. I have complete control over what I'm doing. Writing a novel is like setting out on a journey without knowing who or what I'll encounter, how long it's going to take, or where I'm going to end up.

For each book, there's a back story of where the idea came from. Sometimes it's derived from a current event or topic of discussion, such as 'Deadline.'

I don't write political stuff. I'm sure I've made attempts, but I don't tend to write very topical things, either. I admire those people who do because it's a talent I don't have.

Of course, sometimes when you write personally, you are also writing about society, obliquely reflecting topical issues, but not in a way that people would expect you to or in the way that someone trying to make a point would.

I am very averse to bringing myself forward in print, but as my account will only appear as an appendage to a former production, and as it will be confined to such topics as have connection with my authorship alone, I can hardly accuse myself of a personal intrusion.

IT is difficult to speak or write with becoming moderation or propriety, on topics to which we are biased by prejudice, interest, or even principle.

I end up writing about all kinds of things. I never make an attempt to write about anything in particular. I don't have a little list of topics to write about.

The stories that I tell, the topics that I choose to write about, usually are suggested by something that I've done before.

I can't write about nice, easy topics because that won't change the world. And I do want to change the world - one reader at a time.

I think at the start of writing it was less intense topics, and then once I broke the seal I was more comfortable writing about harder things, and going through family history.

The Jews invented a portable religion in the shape of the Bible, the Torah, and eventually the Talmud, and with other portable forms of writing. So it's now possible to carry the religion, that is embedded in that writing, away from the ruins of political and military power.

You don't think anyone who lives an ordinary life has plenty of trouble and torment to write about?

When people speak to me of the torment of writing, I can think only of what it was like before I wrote: once writing meant writing and not thinking about writing, I knew nothing of any torment.

Well, Toronto, I consider to be the birthplace of my films. I've made three films and this is the third one to premiere here in the same theater on the same day at the same time - they are my audience. They're the people that I think about while I'm writing, directing, and editing. I specifically make movies for them.

I'm a little harsh. When people say, 'I have writers block. What do you suggest?' I say, 'If you can't write, don't write. No one needs your writing. Don't torture yourself.'

I pretty much drink a cup of coffee, write in my journal for a while, and then sit at a computer in my office and torture the keys. My one saving grace as a writer is that, if I'm having trouble with the novel I'm writing, I write something else, a poem or a short story. I try to avoid writer's block by always writing something.