And here we are for the T-Z installment of my writerly quotes. Unfortunately, I don't have any X-Z quotes, so you'll have to settle for only going through W.
If you get in an accident or a barfight and break all the fingers on both hands THEN you can claim writers block. Other than that you have the ability to write. - James R. Tuck, Jr.
The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter—’tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning. - Mark Twain
Substitute "damn" every time you're inclined to write "very;" your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. - Mark Twain
The test of any good fiction is that you should care something for the characters; the good to succeed, the bad to fail. The trouble with most fiction is that you want them all to land in hell, together, as quickly as possible. - Mark Twain
I write to give myself strength. I write to be the characters that I am not. I write to explore all the things I'm afraid of. - Joss Whedon
The hope and aim of a word-handler is that he may communicate a thought or an impression to his reader without the reader’s realizing that he has been dragged through a series of hazardous or grotesque syntactical situations. - E.B. White
You must want to enough. Enough to take all the rejections, enough to pay the price of disappointment and discouragement while you are learning. Like any other artist, you are learning your craft -- then you can add all the genius you like. - Phyllis A. Whitney
Writing is not like painting where you add. It is not what you put on the canvas that the reader sees. Writing is more like a sculpture where you remove, you eliminate in order to make the work visible. Even those pages you remove somehow remain. - Elie Wiesel
If the writing is honest it cannot be separated from the man who wrote it. - Tennessee Williams
With Silver James' help - X Y Z:
"Try to write the best you can without worrying too much about other
things in advance." ~Qiu Xiaolong, best-selling Chinese crime novelist
(living now in St. Louis)
"Make sure the first scene starts with a dead horse in the living room." ~Rebecca York/Ruth Glick, best-selling author
"Books hold no passports. There’s only one true literary tradition: the human." ~ Carlos Ruiz Zafón, Spanish author
Thanks for stopping by. I should have some more guest posters coming around soon.
Showing posts with label quotes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label quotes. Show all posts
Monday, October 14, 2013
Monday, September 9, 2013
Writerly Quotes - Pt 4
Thanks for stopping by again today. I've been lax finding guest posters lately, so here we are with the quotes again. I hope you enjoy these....
The novel is not “a crazy quilt of bits”; it is a logical sequence of psychological events: the movements of stars may seem crazy to the simpleton, but wise men know the comets come back. - Vladimir Nabokov
The reader has certain rights. He bought your story. Think of this as an implicit contract. He's entitled to be entertained, instructed, amused; maybe all three. If he quits in the middle, or puts the book down feeling his time has been wasted, you're in violation. - Larry Niven
We work and write and wait for the big moment to happen. If it happens. In the meantime, we dream of pool boys. - Allison Pang
True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learn’d to dance. - Alexander Pope
There's no such thing as writer's block. That was invented by people in California who couldn't write. - Terry Pratchett
Most writers enjoy two periods of happiness—when a glorious idea comes to mind and, secondly, when a last page has been written and you haven’t had time to know how much better it ought to be. - J.B. Priestley
A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return. - Salman Rushdie
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury; signifying nothing. - William Shakespeare
I'd rather be caught holding up a bank than stealing so much as a two-word phrase from another writer. - Jack Smith
If you're a singer you lose your voice. A baseball player loses his arm. A writer gets more knowledge, and if he's good, the older he gets, the better he writes. - Mickey Spillane
The first chapter sells the book. The last chapter sells the next book. - Mickey Spillane
The profession of book writing makes horse racing seem like a solid, stable business. - John Steinbeck
Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. - William Strunk, Jr.
And that's it for today. Next time I have to do this, should be the T-Z section and therefore, the end. Then I'll have to find something else to put up here when I've been lazy.
Got any quotes you'd like to add?
The novel is not “a crazy quilt of bits”; it is a logical sequence of psychological events: the movements of stars may seem crazy to the simpleton, but wise men know the comets come back. - Vladimir Nabokov
The reader has certain rights. He bought your story. Think of this as an implicit contract. He's entitled to be entertained, instructed, amused; maybe all three. If he quits in the middle, or puts the book down feeling his time has been wasted, you're in violation. - Larry Niven
We work and write and wait for the big moment to happen. If it happens. In the meantime, we dream of pool boys. - Allison Pang
True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learn’d to dance. - Alexander Pope
There's no such thing as writer's block. That was invented by people in California who couldn't write. - Terry Pratchett
Most writers enjoy two periods of happiness—when a glorious idea comes to mind and, secondly, when a last page has been written and you haven’t had time to know how much better it ought to be. - J.B. Priestley
A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return. - Salman Rushdie
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury; signifying nothing. - William Shakespeare
I'd rather be caught holding up a bank than stealing so much as a two-word phrase from another writer. - Jack Smith
If you're a singer you lose your voice. A baseball player loses his arm. A writer gets more knowledge, and if he's good, the older he gets, the better he writes. - Mickey Spillane
The first chapter sells the book. The last chapter sells the next book. - Mickey Spillane
The profession of book writing makes horse racing seem like a solid, stable business. - John Steinbeck
Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. - William Strunk, Jr.
And that's it for today. Next time I have to do this, should be the T-Z section and therefore, the end. Then I'll have to find something else to put up here when I've been lazy.
Got any quotes you'd like to add?
Monday, August 12, 2013
Writerly Quotes - Part 3
And here we are with the quotes again. I scrolled down the database and came up with nothing writerly in the Is or the Js. So today, we're starting with the Ks, ans seeing where that takes us.
Sometimes you have to go on when you don't feel like it, and sometimes you're doing good work when it feels like all you're managing is to shovel shit from a sitting position. - Stephen King
Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind. - Rudyard Kipling
The light that radiates from the great novels time can never dim, for human existence is perpetually being forgotten by man and thus the novelists’ discoveries, however old they may be, will never cease to astonish. - Milan Kundera
If you’re going to be a writer, the first essential is just to write. Do not wait for an idea. Start writing something and the ideas will come. You have to turn the faucet on before the water starts to flow. - Louis L'Amour
In every great novel, who is the hero all the time? Not any of the characters, but some unnamed and nameless flame behind them all. - D.H. Lawrence
Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. - C.S. Lewis
It is impossible to discourage the real writers - they don't give a damn what you say, they're going to write. - Sinclair Lewis
You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club. - Jack London
The writer’s joy is the thought that can become emotion, the emotion that can wholly become a thought. - Thomas Mann
A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. - Thomas Mann
The trouble with writing a book about yourself is that you can’t fool around. If you write about someone else, you can stretch the truth from here to Finland. If you write about yourself the slightest deviation makes you realize instantly that there may be honor among thieves, but you are just a dirty liar. - Groucho Marx
If you want to be a writer, you need to read, and you need to write. Everything else is varying shades of bullshit… - Seanan McGuire
I'm not a very good writer, but I'm an excellent rewriter. - James Michener
I love writing. I love the swirl and swing of words as they tangle with human emotions. - James Michener
Good writing is about making yourself and your ideas understood by someone else. - Miss Snark
Well, we made it to M today. I hope you enjoyed these quotes and maybe were inspired by a few.
Sometimes you have to go on when you don't feel like it, and sometimes you're doing good work when it feels like all you're managing is to shovel shit from a sitting position. - Stephen King
Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind. - Rudyard Kipling
The light that radiates from the great novels time can never dim, for human existence is perpetually being forgotten by man and thus the novelists’ discoveries, however old they may be, will never cease to astonish. - Milan Kundera
If you’re going to be a writer, the first essential is just to write. Do not wait for an idea. Start writing something and the ideas will come. You have to turn the faucet on before the water starts to flow. - Louis L'Amour
In every great novel, who is the hero all the time? Not any of the characters, but some unnamed and nameless flame behind them all. - D.H. Lawrence
Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. - C.S. Lewis
It is impossible to discourage the real writers - they don't give a damn what you say, they're going to write. - Sinclair Lewis
You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club. - Jack London
The writer’s joy is the thought that can become emotion, the emotion that can wholly become a thought. - Thomas Mann
A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. - Thomas Mann
The trouble with writing a book about yourself is that you can’t fool around. If you write about someone else, you can stretch the truth from here to Finland. If you write about yourself the slightest deviation makes you realize instantly that there may be honor among thieves, but you are just a dirty liar. - Groucho Marx
If you want to be a writer, you need to read, and you need to write. Everything else is varying shades of bullshit… - Seanan McGuire
I'm not a very good writer, but I'm an excellent rewriter. - James Michener
I love writing. I love the swirl and swing of words as they tangle with human emotions. - James Michener
Good writing is about making yourself and your ideas understood by someone else. - Miss Snark
Well, we made it to M today. I hope you enjoyed these quotes and maybe were inspired by a few.
Monday, August 5, 2013
Writing Quotes Again... err... Part 2?
Since I don't have a guest for today, I thought I'd share the next round of writerly quotes from my quote database.
There is no mistaking the dismay on the face of a writer who has just heard that his brain child is a deformed idiot. - L. Sprague deCamp
The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words. - Philip K. Dick
This writing business. Pencils and what-not. Over-rated, if you ask me. Silly stuff. Nothing in it. - Eeyore
I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top. - Unknown English Professor
There is no idea so brilliant or original that a sufficiently-untalented writer can't screw it up. - Raymond Feist
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
There are many reasons why novelists write – but they all have one thing in common: a need to create an alternative world. - John Fowles
I'm putting all this down in my memoirs, so if I grow up twisted and warped, the world will know why. - From Brighton Beach Memoirs
Modern poets talk against business, poor things, but all of us write for money. Beginners are subjected to trial by market. - Robert Frost
Write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I'm not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter. - Neil Gaiman
It’s a damn good story. If you have any comments, write them on the back of a check. - Erle Stanley Gardner
Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Words -- so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them. - Nathaniel Hawthorne
Forget all the rules. Forget about being published. Write for yourself and celebrate writing. - Melinda Haynes
Writing and travel broaden your ass if not your mind and I like to write standing up. - Ernest Hemingway
You know that fiction, prose rather, is possibly the roughest trade of all in writing. You do not have the reference, the old important reference. You have the sheet of blank paper, the pencil, and the obligation to invent truer than things can be true. You have to take what is not palpable and make it completely palpable and also have it seem normal and so that it can become a part of experience of the person who reads it. - Ernest Hemingway
When writing a novel a writer should create living people; people not characters. A character is a caricature. - Ernest Hemingway
Today was D-H - because I just have that many writerly quotes (growing all the time, too). I realize today's quotes were pretty tongue-in-cheek and snarky. That's just the way the alphabet fell - and how my mind must've been working the day I chose which quotes to add to the database.
We'll see what next time brings (which could be next week if I don't get off my buns and find a guest for Monday).
There is no mistaking the dismay on the face of a writer who has just heard that his brain child is a deformed idiot. - L. Sprague deCamp
The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words. - Philip K. Dick
This writing business. Pencils and what-not. Over-rated, if you ask me. Silly stuff. Nothing in it. - Eeyore
I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top. - Unknown English Professor
There is no idea so brilliant or original that a sufficiently-untalented writer can't screw it up. - Raymond Feist
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
There are many reasons why novelists write – but they all have one thing in common: a need to create an alternative world. - John Fowles
I'm putting all this down in my memoirs, so if I grow up twisted and warped, the world will know why. - From Brighton Beach Memoirs
Modern poets talk against business, poor things, but all of us write for money. Beginners are subjected to trial by market. - Robert Frost
Write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I'm not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter. - Neil Gaiman
It’s a damn good story. If you have any comments, write them on the back of a check. - Erle Stanley Gardner
Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Words -- so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them. - Nathaniel Hawthorne
Forget all the rules. Forget about being published. Write for yourself and celebrate writing. - Melinda Haynes
Writing and travel broaden your ass if not your mind and I like to write standing up. - Ernest Hemingway
You know that fiction, prose rather, is possibly the roughest trade of all in writing. You do not have the reference, the old important reference. You have the sheet of blank paper, the pencil, and the obligation to invent truer than things can be true. You have to take what is not palpable and make it completely palpable and also have it seem normal and so that it can become a part of experience of the person who reads it. - Ernest Hemingway
When writing a novel a writer should create living people; people not characters. A character is a caricature. - Ernest Hemingway
Today was D-H - because I just have that many writerly quotes (growing all the time, too). I realize today's quotes were pretty tongue-in-cheek and snarky. That's just the way the alphabet fell - and how my mind must've been working the day I chose which quotes to add to the database.
We'll see what next time brings (which could be next week if I don't get off my buns and find a guest for Monday).
Monday, July 8, 2013
No Guest but... Writing Quotes!
Hi Everyone!
Securing a guest for today totally slipped my mind. Let's just say it was due to sprint re-writing and leave it at that, shall we?
So, since I don't have anyone spouting one long, wise blog today, I thought I'd share some little snippets of wisdom in the form of quotes about writing:
"Writers must fortify themselves with pride and egotism as best they can. The process is analogous to using sandbags and loose timbers to protect a house against flood. Writers are vulnerable creatures like anyone else. For what do they have in reality? Not sandbags, not timbers. Just a flimsy reputation and a name." - Brian Aldiss
"I think the first duty of all art, including fiction of any kind, is to entertain. That is to say, to hold interest. No matter how worthy the message of something, if it's dull, you're just not communicating." - Poul Anderson
"Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable." - Sir Francis Bacon
"Quantity produces quality. If you only write a few things, you're doomed." - Ray Bradbury
"Everybody walks past a thousand story ideas every day. The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them. Most people don't see any." - Orson Scott Card
"The faster I write the better my output. If I'm going slow, I'm in trouble. It means I'm pushing the words instead of being pulled by them." - Raymond Chandler
"It is perfectly okay to write garbage – as long as you edit brilliantly." - C.J. Cherryh
"The best time for planning a book is while you're doing the dishes." Agatha Christie
"Writing is an adventure. To begin with, it is a toy and an amusement. then it becomes a mistress, then it becomes a master, the it becomes a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster and fling him to the public." - Winston Churchill
"The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy
"Books aren't written, they're rewritten. Including your own. It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn't quite done it…" - Michael Crichton
I was going to do all the writing quotes I have in my database, but after seeing just how many there are, I opted to just give you A though C. Writers are a quote-worthy bunch. I'll post more next time I have a free Monday.
Look forward to next week, when I have Maria Zannini scheduled to guest. I can't wait to see what she has to say! =o)
Securing a guest for today totally slipped my mind. Let's just say it was due to sprint re-writing and leave it at that, shall we?
So, since I don't have anyone spouting one long, wise blog today, I thought I'd share some little snippets of wisdom in the form of quotes about writing:
"Writers must fortify themselves with pride and egotism as best they can. The process is analogous to using sandbags and loose timbers to protect a house against flood. Writers are vulnerable creatures like anyone else. For what do they have in reality? Not sandbags, not timbers. Just a flimsy reputation and a name." - Brian Aldiss
"I think the first duty of all art, including fiction of any kind, is to entertain. That is to say, to hold interest. No matter how worthy the message of something, if it's dull, you're just not communicating." - Poul Anderson
"Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable." - Sir Francis Bacon
"Quantity produces quality. If you only write a few things, you're doomed." - Ray Bradbury
"Everybody walks past a thousand story ideas every day. The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them. Most people don't see any." - Orson Scott Card
"The faster I write the better my output. If I'm going slow, I'm in trouble. It means I'm pushing the words instead of being pulled by them." - Raymond Chandler
"It is perfectly okay to write garbage – as long as you edit brilliantly." - C.J. Cherryh
"The best time for planning a book is while you're doing the dishes." Agatha Christie
"Writing is an adventure. To begin with, it is a toy and an amusement. then it becomes a mistress, then it becomes a master, the it becomes a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster and fling him to the public." - Winston Churchill
"The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy
"Books aren't written, they're rewritten. Including your own. It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn't quite done it…" - Michael Crichton
I was going to do all the writing quotes I have in my database, but after seeing just how many there are, I opted to just give you A though C. Writers are a quote-worthy bunch. I'll post more next time I have a free Monday.
Look forward to next week, when I have Maria Zannini scheduled to guest. I can't wait to see what she has to say! =o)
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Need a Little Inspiration?
My friend Janet has this weekly thing she does where she posts inspiring quotes. I think this week's compilation is particularly poignant - especially considering the end of NaNo is fast approaching.
Head on over to soak up some inspirational words from some other amazing authors. And while you're at it, leave an encouraging comment or two. =o)
Are you participating in NaNo this year? How're you doing?
Head on over to soak up some inspirational words from some other amazing authors. And while you're at it, leave an encouraging comment or two. =o)
Are you participating in NaNo this year? How're you doing?
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