Quotes About Authorship

Writing is wretched, discouraging, physically unhealthy, infinitely frustrating work. And when it all comes together it's utterly glorious." National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) Pep Talk

Most of the classical citations you shall hear or read in the current journals or speeches were not drawn from the originals, but from previous quotations in English books...

The reader is entertained by the journey of another, but the writer is the changer of worlds.

The novel is a prose narrative of some length that has something wrong with it.

My stories run up and bite me in the leg -- I respond by writing down everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off.

You're too busy writing the next book to worry about Googling yourself all the time.

I didn't actually get along with my dad when I was growing up, so by the time I was in my 20s, I didn't think I was going to be a writer.

I had this thing where I only wanted to work on original material, no adaptations, and obviously, that changed. I really wanted to have the resources and have the space and the time to tell stories that I've really cared about. I've kind of changed my approach, but I've gotten to do that, to tell stories that I really care about.

I consider what I write to be literature. I choose the words carefully.

I think, as a writer, sometimes you do worry, 'Am I just writing, or am I putting the burden of African-Americans on my shoulder and carrying it?' But if we just write the stories that we're supposed to write, that's when we have the biggest impact.

I am writing my own legacy, and I am carrying NXT along for the ride.

So what I do is supervise the boarding process trying to get the shows the way I'd like them to be. And in some cases I've completely redone a board myself even though I'm not credited for it.

It's a very dull thing to watch, a writer at work. So dull that whole casts of characters show up just to watch the boring writer writing.

I don't categorize myself as an 85-year-old woman who has written an erotic novel. I categorize myself as a writer who's written an erotic novel.

By nature, I sit alone in a room and type... My goal was never celebrity.

My first book, 'Running Loose', was censored back in 1983 or '84. Every book I've written since has been censored somewhere.

As a writer of fiction, lying is the central thing to all books.

Life gives you so many alternatives to choose from, and... you judge these as best as you can until something comes along like 9/11. And it's the central event of my lifetime, so I knew I had to write about that.

You need to be the CEO of your own book.

I want to be a better writer. I want to learn and grow, to know how to tell stories in a different and more challenging way. I've learned it doesn't get easier each time. It actually gets harder.

If I wanted to change the world, the last thing I would do is write a play.

It gives you a high when you create characters and make them do what you want them to do.

Here's an idea: Spend two or three hours a day at least five days a week in front of a bookstore wearing a sandwich board with your bookcover on it while you chase and chat with anyone you can corral and who is willing to talk to you.

I didn't even know for years that people ever even got paid for this, because they don't teach you that in school. They don't say Shakespeare got a check.