WRITING QUOTES XXV

quotations about writing

No reason at all why one should go on writing just for the sake of it. I think it is very important to stop when you haven't got anything to say.

JULIAN BARNES

The Paris Review, winter 2000


I'm sympathetic with new writers who focus so much on the beginning. That's what you show friends or beta readers to see if you are just wasting your time or if there's something there. But you won't really know until you finish the whole book.

JEFF ABBOTT

"Rules of Fiction with Jeff Abbott", Suspense Magazine, January 19, 2017

Tags: Jeff Abbott


We live in a world ruled by fictions of every kind--mass merchandising, advertising, politics conducted as a branch of advertising, the instant translation of science and technology into popular imagery, the increasing blurring and intermingling of identities within the realm of consumer goods, the preempting of any free or original imaginative response to experience by the television screen. We live inside an enormous novel. For the writer in particular it is less and less necessary for him to invent the fictional content of his novel. The fiction is already there. The writer's task is to invent the reality.

J. G. BALLARD

Crash

Tags: J. G. Ballard


There is absolutely everything in great fiction but a clear answer.

EUDORA WELTY

On Writing

Tags: Eudora Welty


Writers, especially when they act in a body and with one direction, have great influence on the public mind.

EDMUND BURKE

Reflections on the Revolution in France

Tags: Edmund Burke


In the writing process, the more the story cooks, the better. The brain works for you even when you are at rest. I find dreams particularly useful. I myself think a great deal before I go to sleep and the details sometimes unfold in the dream.

DORIS LESSING

The New York Times, April 22, 1984


Brevity is the sister of talent.

ANTON CHEKHOV

letter to A. P. Chekhov, April 11, 1889

Tags: Anton Chekhov


Crossing out is an art that is, perhaps, even more difficult than writing. It requires the sharpest eye to decide what is superfluous and must be removed. And it requires ruthlessness toward yourself -- the greatest ruthlessness and self-sacrifice. You must know how to sacrifice parts in the name of the whole.

YEVGENY ZAMYATIN

Theme and Plot

Tags: Yevgeny Zamyatin


When I write, I go to live inside the book. By which I mean, mentally I can experience everything I'm writing about. I can see it, hear its sounds, feel its heat or rain. The characters become better known to me than the closest family or friends. This makes the writing-down part very simple most of the time. I only need to describe what's already there in front of me. That said, it won't be a surprise if I add that the imagined worlds quickly become entangled with the so-called reality of this one. Since I write almost every day, and I think (and dream) constantly about my work, it occurs to me I must spend more time in all these places than here.

TANITH LEE

author's note, Wolf Tower


Now, writing every day, and being paid for it and encouraged to do it, it was as if, in the midst of the clichéd dark and stormy night, I found the magical inn, its windows golden lit, and Summer was due to start tomorrow. I can only work at one thing well. Deprive me of that, and my "back-up plan," even now, will be the empty, stormy, darkened heath -- where, incidentally, even unpublished, somehow I'll still be writing.

TANITH LEE

interview, Intergalactic Medicine Show

Tags: Tanith Lee


A person is a fool to become a writer. His only compensation is absolute freedom. He has no master except his own soul, and that, I am sure, is why he does it.

ROALD DAHL

Boy

Tags: Roald Dahl


I turn sentences around. That's my life. I write a sentence and then I turn it around. Then I look at it and turn it around again.

PHILIP ROTH

Ghost Writer

Tags: Philip Roth


What I like to do is write the story, see where it takes me -- and then check out the details I don't know. When I first started writing, there were a lot of things about the world that I understood but didn't have the vocabulary for -- and even more things that I just had no idea about. For instance, do you know all the parts of a door frame? Or what flowers bloom in the spring in alpine climates? There's a surprising amount of homework involved in writing a book.

PATRICIA BRIGGS

interview, Bitten by Books, March 30, 2010


Writing is a tough thing and you only get better with practice. Just like free throws.

NICK WESTFALL

"Man writes directorial debut movie 'Finding Home'", myfox8, March 30, 2017


I'm a pretty autobiographical writer. I like a high ratio of true events to made-up events or rearranged events. I've always felt that if you think you can find a way to tell the truth and keep the fictional flux going, it's at least a good idea to try, because very often the truth is more interesting than the posed picture, the tableau. The messiness of truth is a useful corrective.

NICHOLSON BAKER

The Paris Review, fall 2011

Tags: Nicholson Baker


Much modern prose is praised for its terseness, its scrupulous avoidance of curlicue, etcetera. But I don't feel the deeper rhythm there. I don't think these writers are being terse out of choice. I think they are being terse because it's the only way they can write.

MARTIN AMIS

The Paris Review, spring 1998


All stories are about wolves. All worth repeating, that is. Anything else is sentimental drivel.

MARGARET ATWOOD

The Blind Assassin

Tags: Margaret Atwood


The man, the writer, the instrument of the creation will die, but his creation does not die.

LUIGI PIRANDELLO

Six Characters in Search of an Author

Tags: Luigi Pirandello


I don't particularly care about having [my characters] talk realistically, that doesn't mean very much to me. Actually, a lot of people speak more articulately than some critics think, but before the 20th century it really didn't occur to many writers that their language had to be the language of everyday speech. When Wordsworth first considered that in poetry, it was considered very much of a shocker. And although I'm delighted to have things in ordinary speech, it's not what I'm trying to perform myself at all: I want my characters to get their ideas across, and I want them to be articulate.

LOUIS AUCHINCLOSS

interview, Bomb Magazine, fall 1997

Tags: Louis Auchincloss


I don't think I'm cut out for a job where you have to look professionally tidy. I prefer working in my pajamas and taking showers after lunch.

KELLY LINK

"Words by Flashlight", Sybil's Garage, June 7, 2006

Tags: Kelly Link