Writing Quotes

The chief glory of every people arises from its authors.

Authors and lovers always suffer some infatuation, from which only absence can set them free.

You may abuse a tragedy, though you cannot write one. You may scold a carpenter who has made you a bad table, though you cannot make a table. It is not your trade to make tables.

He who writes much will not easily escape a manner, such a recurrence of particular modes as may be easily noted.

The animadversions of critics are commonly such as may easily provoke the sedatest writer to some quickness of resentment and asperity of reply.

Nobody can write the life of a man but those who have eat and drunk and lived in social intercourse with him.

Tediousness is the most fatal of all faults.

Women can spin very well; but they cannot make a good book of cookery.

Everything that I write comes when it wants to, out of its own need and it dictates its form. I don't say, "I am going to write a novel."

I can't do a linear novel. I'm just going to write what I need to write.

I can't stand it when people say, "If you're writing a novel, you should read this and that." Because it's like giving someone another person's prescription. How do you know that's what they need?

[Jorge Luis Borges] had short stories, and I was trying to learn how to write short stories, and then he had these things in the middle that were like fables, and I loved hearing fables.

Read in order to write, but paint in order to paint.

I pretty much only write by default, because I want to make certain projects so instead of trying to wait and find them, I create them, but I'm not really a writer.

It took me nine months to write 60 pages. It was very frustrating

Sometimes I panic and think I can't really write.

I realised I'd never climb Everest but thought I could still write a book

Every moment I choose to write about is one I have deemed important enough to dwell inside of and share with others. I am holding this moment up to the light and saying, "Wow, will you look at that?"

I don't write toward a genre, and I try not to make claim to a genre after a book is published. That said, The Guardians isn't poetry. It's prose.

What I really value about being a writer is that I can go to rehearsal when I want to, and then, when I need to be at home writing or with my kids, I go home.

I don't know if you've ever tried writing a Doctor Who story, but it's a lot more difficult than it initially appears, especially if you've got more than one assistant.

I did not want to write a story about the invasion of Earth, so I had to create a race capable of living nearby, which meant to either on the Moon, on Mars, or on Venus. I picked Venus.

But with writing, all you need is a pad of paper.

The reason I started writing movies was because I kept getting parts that I just kind of stepped into. I didn't have to do a lot of work and I ended up getting sort of bored.

When I was younger I wanted to be a big movie star who'd get to be funny on talk shows and then I wanted to retire and write science fiction.

I love song writing, so I'm always happy to write for other musicians.

Stories, like whiskey, must be allowed to mature in the cask.

I never wanted to be a writer; I just had stories I wanted to share so I learnt how to write and kept going. If I could sing or paint, I would.

If I knew how to say it directly, I would not need to write poetry. I would just talk to people and be happy.

It is dishonorable to say one thing and think another; how much more dishonorable to write one thing and think another.

Writing scripts is a laborious job that can be a real pain.

Writing is very much a playground - an artistic playground. It's the most fun thing I do.

Many poets write books. They'll tell you: Well, I've got my next book, but there are two poems I need to write, one about x, one about y. This is a wonder to me.

I think that my work is easy to understand because I am not a thinker, I am not a... How can I put it? I write the way I perceive, I guess.

In writing of Indian culture, I am highly conscious of my own subjectivity; arguably, there is more than one Indian culture, and certainly more than one view of Indian culture.

There's so much writing I could have done and so many ideas that I had and so many things I wanted to work on that I didn't. I like too much having things in my head rather than doing the work.

And I'm a slow writer: five, six hundred words is a good day. That's the reason it took me 20 years to write those million and a half words of the Civil War.

I guess a witness is all I am. I think as a writer, you're pretty removed. Writing is a very selfish, individualistic pursuit. So in that sense I'm a witness because I'm not participating.

The writing of words can lead to all sorts of absurdities.

I am constantly amazed at how little painters know about painting, writers about writing, merchants about business, manufacturers about manufacturing. Most men just drift.

I'm not writing about things other women do. I'm writing for other women to have more self-confidence because I need it myself! And if more women were in power, I would feel more comfortable.

[My muse] she's impatient with me, because I don't do what I should do: sit down and write.

I think that one is constantly startled by the things that appear before you on the page when you're writing.

The first book is the book you have to write to get back at your parents; the book you always had in you. Once you get that out of your way, you can start writing books.

The part of my writing I find the most rewarding is when people write to me or speak to me in public to tell me how his or her life has been changed by my books.

Writing novels is the most exciting

All over America, people are making kamikaze choices about what to wear. They are misrepresenting the goods. They are letting their clothes write checks that their personalities cannot cash.

Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile.

I'm a crap guitarist and I find it really hard writing on my own.

Listen to what children have to say-their windows to the soul are unclouded.