There are some jewels on this site: http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/72-of-the-best-quotes-about-writing “To gain your own voice, you have to forget about having it heard.” —Allen Ginsberg, WD
I forgot one of my faves - “Oftentimes an originator of new language forms is called ‘pretentious’ by jealous talents. But it ain’t whatcha write, it’s the way atcha write it.” - Jack Kerouc.
When I write I don't think of the audience. After the fact I think, "Well there. I hope they like it." - William Gaddis
Jan, that applies far beyond the field of writing. Once, while I was sitting in a hospital waiting room with my son (he was 7 at the time), two cartoon characters on television expressed it this way: "Good judgment comes from experience." "Yeah, but experience comes from bad judgment."
“They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.” -Edgar Allan Poe I posted this one in another quote thread and it was actually written by a screen writer, but I think it still applies and I love it, so here it is: “We step from one piece of holy ground to the next, under stars that ask: ‘Imagine for one second you could drop in on a past life. What would charm you, make you proud?’ Ask yourself that, and the question of what to do in this life becomes so simple it’s terrifying.” -Alex Ventoux Musashi wasn't known as a writer, but he was known for being a writer, painter, warrior etc, and this, too, applies very well to writing, methinks: “It is said the warrior's is the twofold Way of pen and sword, and he should have a taste for both Ways. Even if a man has no natural ability he can be a warrior by sticking assiduously to both divisions of the Way.” -Miyamoto Musashi “The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.” -William Blake This too, comes from a screen writer: “You know what inspiration is? A momentary cessation of stupidity.” -Jonas Blane “If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.” -Toni Morrison I saw this here, someone had it as their signature, I think (sorry, can't remember who): “You hold a pen in your hand. Start writing about a tomorrow that no one else can.” -Tomohisa Yamashita
"The hardest trade in the world is writing straight, honest prose about human beings." - Ernest Hemingway
I presented my editor with Legs, which was then about one hundred pages. He bought it. Then it took me six years to finish it. I wrote it eight times and seven times it was no good. Six times it was especially no good. The seventh time out it was pretty good, though it was way too long. My son was six years old and so was my novel and they were both the same height. I was wounded many times in the writing of that novel. - William Kennedy
I love this - it's so blatantly self-serving! My definition of a good editor is a man I think charming, who sends me large checks, praises my work, my physical beauty, and my sexual prowess, and who has a stranglehold on the publisher and the bank. - John Cheever
Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college. -Kurt Vonnegut
I have grown fond of semicolons in recent years. The semicolon tells you that there is still some question about the preceding full sentence; something needs to be added; it reminds you sometimes of the Greek usage. It is almost always a greater pleasure to come across a semicolon than a period. The period tells you that that is that; if you didn't get all the meaning you wanted or expected, anyway you got all the writer intended to parcel out and now you have to move along. But with a semicolon there you get a pleasant little feeling of expectancy; there is more to come; to read on; it will get clearer. - Lewis Thomas
I think that novels that leave out technology misrepresent life as badly as Victorians misrepresented life by leaving out sex. -Kurt Vonnegut
“There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.” ― W. Somerset Maugham
“So okay― there you are in your room with the shade down and the door shut and the plug pulled out of the base of the telephone. You've blown up your TV and committed yourself to a thousand words a day, come hell or high water. Now comes the big question: What are you going to write about? And the equally big answer: Anything you damn well want.” -Stephen King
When men ask me how I know so much about men, they get a simple answer: everything I know about men, I learned from me. - Anton Chekhov
The quote in my sig came from Homer Hickam, the guy who wrote Rocket Boys. I met him at a convention once years ago. "As long as you have the dream, as long as you persevere, nothing can stop you." - Homer Hickam.
I am irritated by my own writing. I am like a violinist whose ear is true, but whose fingers refuse to reproduce precisely the sound he hears within. - Gustave Flaubert Neither Christ nor Buddha nor Socrates wrote a book, for to do that is to exchange life for a logical process. - W. B. Yeats
"The written word is weak. Many people prefer life to it. Life gets your blood going, & it smells good. Writing is mere writing, literature is mere. It appeals only to the subtlest senses—the imagination’s vision, & the imagination’s hearing—& the moral sense, & the intellect. This writing that you do, that so thrills you, that so rocks & exhilarates you, as if you were dancing next to the band, is barely audible to anyone else." Annie Dillard
"The obverse of this freedom, of course, is that your work is so meaningless, so fully for yourself alone, and so worthless to the world, that no one except you cares whether you do it well, or ever." -Annie Dillard That one is my favourite.
Zounds! I was never so bethumped with words! - William Shakespeare (because we need a Shakespeare quote every once in a while)
“I have no taste for either poverty or honest labor, so writing is the only recourse left for me” Hunter S. Thompson “I've always considered writing the most hateful kind of work. I suspect it's a bit like fucking, which is only fun for amateurs. Old whores don't do much giggling.” Hunter S. Thompson "Reality is whatever refuses to go away after I stop believing in it." Philip K. Dick "Arguing with a woman is like trying to read a newspaper in the wind." Fjodor Dostojevski "Prose is architecture, not interior decoration." Ernest Hemingway
