WRITING QUOTES XXV

quotations about writing

The art of the word is painting + architecture + music.

YEVGENY ZAMYATIN

The New Russian Prose

Tags: Yevgeny Zamyatin


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

MARGARET ATWOOD

The Blind Assassin

Tags: Margaret Atwood


I like to have a hero a little underpowered. I mean, Spiderman is far cooler than Superman. How do you challenge Superman?

PATRICIA BRIGGS

interview, Bitten by Books, March 30, 2010

Tags: Patricia Briggs


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


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


Getting out of bed of a morning has never been a problem, but I've noticed of late that my writing is better in the afternoon. The mornings are methodical, when all the blockwork and first-fix stuff takes place. The ornamentation or even de-ornamentation -- the things that separate writing from writing -- don't seem possible until later in the day, when I've established some perspective.

SIMON ARMITAGE

"Language is my enemy -- I spend my life battling with it", The Guardian, March 25, 2017


In the end, the secret of writing is to be a tortoise, not a hare.

JONATHAN KELLERMAN

"Novelist explains how psychology training honed his writing", USC News, February 25, 2016


I write fiction and I'm told it’s autobiography, I write autobiography and I'm told it's fiction, so since I'm so dim and they're so smart, let them decide what it is or it isn't.

PHILIP ROTH

Deception: A Novel


Writing is a conversation, to me. The best kind. You can't get interrupted.

GERALD ASHER

speech at the Symposium for Professional Wine Writers, February 2011

Tags: Gerald Asher


Failure has been my best friend as a writer. It tests you, to see if you have what it takes to see it through.

MARKUS ZUSAK

"Why I Write", The Guardian, March 28, 2008


The greater the length, the more beautiful will the piece be by reason of its size, provided that the whole be perspicuous.

ARISTOTLE

Poetics

Tags: Aristotle


Whenever they tell me children want this sort of book and children need this sort of writing, I am going to smile politely and shut my earlids. I am a writer, not a caterer. There are plenty of caterers. But what children most want and need is what we and they don't know they want and don't think they need, and only writers can offer it to them.

URSULA K. LE GUIN

"A Message About Messages", CBC Magazine

Tags: Ursula K. Le Guin


You must keep sending work out; you must never let a manuscript do nothing but eat its head off in a drawer. You send that work out again and again, while you're working on another one. If you have talent, you will receive some measure of success -- but only if you persist.

ISAAC ASIMOV

attributed, How to Become a Famous Writer Before You're Dead

Tags: Isaac Asimov


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


What writers do is they tell their own story constantly through other people's stories. They imagine other people, and those other people are carrying the burden of their struggles, their questions about themselves.

TOBIAS WOLFF

Fiction Writers Review, April 5, 2009

Tags: Tobias Wolff


It's a principle of mine to come into the story as late as possible, and to tell it as fast as you can.

JOHN LE CARRÉ

interview, The Paris Review, summer 1997

Tags: John le Carré


Be a mere assistant to your unconscious. Do only half the work. The rest will do itself.

JEAN COCTEAU

Diary of an Unknown

Tags: Jean Cocteau


Someone watches over us when we write. Mother. Teacher. Shakespeare. God.

MARTIN AMIS

London Fields

Tags: Martin Amis


The process of creating is related to the process of dreaming although when you are writing you're doing it and when you're dreaming, it's doing you.

ROBERT STONE

attributed, A Writer's Book of Days


I couldn't imagine, and I don't say this with any pride, but I really couldn't imagine writing without a desperate deadline.

HUNTER S. THOMPSON

The Paris Review, fall 2000