Quotes About Authorship

If I don't write it, they can't buy it.

When you're a writer, the question people always ask you is, "Where do you get your ideas?" Writers hate this question. It's like asking Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen, "Where do you get your leeches?" You don't get ideas. Ideas get you.

I was very happy sitting alone at a dining room table, writing a script.

Complete it-you cannot sell an unfinished book.

It's a book. It's mine. And it's done.

I write in terror...I have to talk myself into bravery with every sentence, sometimes every syllable.

The novella will be called, I think, "The Messiah of Stockholm." It takes place in Stockholm. I'd better say no more, or the Muse will wipe it out.

I'll read it," he said, smiling. " But you needn't worry. As long as you write about things that interest you your books will interest other people. Just keep on writing. Don't stop.

I wrote a play once called 'Lobby Hero,' which I thought turned out very well, but there's no final version of it. I published the one we produced, but there are seven other versions with different variations sitting in my desk at home.

I was unwise enough to actually mention this in public a few times, and in fact to point out that there were two versions of the book now. One of them had somebody else's name on the cover, one had my name on the cover.

Writing on my own versus co-writing kind of is the exact same thing because we don't sit in the same room when we write. We're always writing alone anyway.

These are old issues. Female power, misogyny, the treatment of women, how you make meaning in the world. And these are all issues that I've been thinking about and writing about for a very long time.

For a very long time, I thought everyone I met through the process of getting an agent and a publishing deal had made a mistake. When they agreed to pay me for the book, I thought they would ask me for the money back.

I take a very long time to write my books - from five to ten years.

You can get away with making some extremely bold statements by Trojan Horsing them into a narrative via comedy.

I write a book a year while creating TV and film projects. And being a writer isn't just writing: I have to chase down paychecks and manage foreign tax payments. I maintain a vibrant relationship with readers and bloggers. And when it comes to Hollywood, I typically have to have fifteen business meetings in the hopes that one leads to a project.

I've been associated with Macmillan for over 45 years. I'd like to thank them for their continued commitment to my backlist and I look forward to continuing to work with them as they publish my next novel, 'Vicious Circle' in 2013.

For me, my core genius lies in the area of teaching and motivating. I love to do it, I do it well, and people report that they get great value from it. Another core genius is compiling and writing books. Along with my co-author Mark Victor Hansen and others, I have written, co-authored, compiled and edited more than 200 books.

In January 1962, when I was the author of one and a half unperformed plays, I attended a student production of 'The Birthday Party' at the Victoria Rooms in Bristol. Just before it began, I realised that Harold Pinter was sitting in front of me.

I think of myself now as a writer, although I wouldn't go as far as to say 'novelist' because that sounds like a Victorian person.

I have never started a novel - I mean except the first, when I was starting a novel just to start a novel - I've never written one without rereading Victory. It opens up the possibilities of a novel. It makes it seem worth doing.

I remember going over proofs of this book - my first book - back in 2001, in a bar in Toronto called the 'Victory Cafe', and thinking sadly to myself, 'This is a very good manuscript but not a very good book.' I don't know what I meant by that, but I was pretty heartbroken and sure it was true.

I still direct my own videos.

The 'Down in the DM' to 'Rake It Up' to videos, the artwork... everything is 100 percent me. If you want to sample it, if it's going to be in a movie, whatever, you gotta call me.