Quotes About Writing

Words are like breath. You say them and they're gone. But writing traps them.

If you never write anything down then no one knows exactly what you said so you can always change it.

Druids are not allowed to write anything down, it's against the rules. You know that! Once you write something down it becomes fixed. It becomes dogma. People can argue about it, they become authoritative, they refer to the texts, they produce new manuscripts, they argue more and soon they're putting each other to death. If you never write anything down then no one knows exactly what you said so you can always change it.

Words are like breath," she said. "You say them and they're gone. But writing traps them. You could write down stories, poems.

Maybe I did write our story to be free of it, even if I never can be.

Ich schreibe aus demselben Grund, aus dem andere lesen: Man will nicht nur ein Leben leben.

Your writing is never as good as you hoped; but never as bad as you feared.

My advice to anyone who wishes to write is to know all the very best literature by heart, and ignore the rest as completely as possible.

First: never use a long word if a short word will do. Second: if you want to make a statement with a great many qualifications, put some of the qualifications in separate sentences. Third: do not let the beginning of your sentence lead the reader to an expectation which is contradicted by the end.

Usually two opposite kinds of advice are given simultaneously by two organized bodies of men; this is called politics. The skill required for this kind of work is not knowledge of the subjects as to which advice is given, but knowledge of the art of persuasive speaking and writing, i.e., of advertising.

Having, by a time of very intense concentration, planted the problem in my subconsciousness, it would germinate underground until, suddenly, the solution emerged with blinding clarity, so that it only remained to write down what had appeared as if in a revelation.

Bir filozof olarak Aristoteles, kendisinden önceki bütün filozoflardan birçok bak?mdan farkl?d?r. Bir profesör gibi yazan ilk kiÅŸidir: yazd?klar? sistematiktir, tart??malar? baÅŸl?klara ayr?l?r, ilhaml? bir peygamber deÄŸil, profesyonel bir öÄŸretmendir. (s. 299)

No one is asking, let alone demanding, that you write. The world is not waiting with bated breath for your article or book. Whether or not you get a single word on paper, the sun will rise, the earth will spin, the universe will expand. Writing is forever and always a choice - your choice.

Along this path of ministry, God has used an approach over and over again that I've finally come to more readily expect. He has taught me to listen to the repetitive requests of the body of Christ, and I will often discover what He wants me to do. Case in point: I had no plan whatsoever to write women's

I write Not For the sake of glory Not For the sake of fame Not For the sake of success But for the sake of my soul

As a past president of the Writers Guild, I think women shouldn't write for free. Maybe you have to do it for a time, to make a reputation, but I think the idea of giving your work away is the beginning of authors not being able to make a living.

My own way of writing is very meditated and, despite my reputation, rather slow-moving. So I do spend a good deal of time contemplating endings. The final ending is usually arrived at simply by intuition.

Sometimes we pray in our heads and we never get a real opportunity to solidify what it is that we're praying for or what we're praying about. So once you write it down, it's like a flow. It comes out and you solidify the thought or the idea or the request.

Generally, if you preface an interview request with, 'I'm an author writing a book,' for some reason, that seems to open a lot of doors.

I think of every book as a single entity, and some have later gone on to become a series, often at the request of readers.

I was obsessed with George Orwell for years. I remember going to the town library and having to put in interlibrary loan requests to get the compilation of his BBC radio pieces. I had to get everything he ever wrote.

I don't really write for an audience. I just write what the subject seems to me to require.

If you here require a practical rule of me, I will present you with this: 'Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it - whole-heartedly - and delete it before sending your manuscript to press.'

I've had a few jobs, but if you want to be a writer, you're better off getting a job that doesn't require that you do anything.