Quotes About Persistence

Almost there! Those are not words any writer pines to hear. Much more preferable is "masterpiece" or "timeless brilliance" or "it shall live forever.

Seek with enough conviction aforethought and ye shall find.

The place where you made your stand never mattered. Only that you were there...and still on your feet.

When asked, How do you write? I invariably answer, One word at a time, and the answer is invariably dismissed. But that is all it is. It sounds too simple to be true, but consider the Great Wall of China, if you will: one stone at a time, man. That's all. One stone at a time. But I've read you can see that motherfucker from space without a telescope.

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.

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.

Talent is a wonderful thing, but it won't carry a quitter.

the only mortal sin is giving up.

If I kept saying it; if I kept reaching out. My accident really taught me just one thing: the only way to go on is to go on. To say 'I can do this' even when you know you can't.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. When you find something at which you have talent, you do that thing (what ever it is) until your fingers bleed or your eyes pop out of your head.

The trick is to teach yourself to read in small sips as well as long swallows.

The road and the tale have both been long, would you not say so? The trip has been long and the cost has been high... but no great thing was ever attained easily. A long tale, like a tall Tower, must be built a stone at a time.

He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts

The past is obdurate.

Remember that hope is a good thing, Red, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

But see that you get on. That's your job in this hard world, to keep your love alive and see that you get on, no matter what. Pull your act together and just go on.

You are the grim, goal-oriented ones who will not believe that the joy is in the journey rather than the destination no matter how many times it has been proven to you.

We never cease wanting what we want, whether it's good for us or not.

Sometimes you have to go on when you don't feel like it, and sometimes you're doing good work when it feels like all you're managing is to shovel shit from a sitting position.

We all do what we can, and it has to be good enough, and if it isn't good enough, it has to do.

Talent renders the whole idea of rehearsal meaningless; when you find something at which you are talented, you do it (whatever it is) until your fingers bleed or your eyes are ready to fall out of your head. Even when no one is listening (or reading or watching), every outing is a bravura performance, because you as the creator are happy. Perhaps even ecstatic.

Because talent won't be quiet, doesn't know how to be quiet, he said. Whether it's a talent for safe-cracking, thought-reading, or dividing ten-digit numbers in your head, it screams to be used. It never shuts up. It'll wake you in the middle of your tiredest night, screaming, 'Use me, use me, use me! I'm tired of just sitting here! Use me, fuckhead, use me!

The monster nevers dies.

People with a high tolerance for boredom can get a lot of thinking done.