Writing Quotes - Page 31

• Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.

  Mark Twain

  Confusing, Easy, Crosses

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• Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Inspirational, Life, Beautiful

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• It is better to write a bad first draft than to write no first draft at all.

  Will Shetterly

  Book, Firsts, Novelists

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• It's none of their business that you have to learn how to write. Let them think you were born that way.

  Ernest Hemingway

  Business, Thinking, Way

  "With Hemingway". Book by Arnold Samuelson, 1984.

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• Don't say the old lady screamed. Bring her on and let her scream.

  Mark Twain

  Inspiration, Scream, Old Lady

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• Writing is nothing more than a guided dream.

  Jorge Luis Borges

  Dream

  Jorge Luis Borges (1978). “Doctor Brodie's Report”, Plume Books

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• I have never thought of myself as a good writer. Anyone who wants reassurance of that should read one of my first drafts. But I'm one of the world's great rewriters.

  James A. Michener

  World, Want, Firsts

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• The essence of drama is that man cannot walk away from the consequences of his own deeds.

  Harold Hayes

  Drama, Men, Essence

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• The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.

  Mark Twain

  Inspirational, Funny, Humorous

  Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain on Common Sense: Timeless Advice and Words of Wisdom from America's Most-Revered Humorist”, p.13, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

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• I have rewritten — often several times — every word I have ever published. My pencils outlast their erasers.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Revision, Pencils, Erasers

  Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (1973). “Strong opinions”, McGraw-Hill Companies

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• Stories may well be lies, but they are good lies that say true things, and which can sometimes pay the rent.

  Neil Gaiman

  Lying, Stories, May

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• The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Inspirational, Motivational, Teaching

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• People are certainly impressed by the aura of creative power which a writer may wear, but can easily demolish it with a few well-chosen questions. Bob Shaw has observed that the deadliest questions usually come as a pair: "Have you published anything?" - loosely translated as: I've never heard of you - and "What name do you write under?" - loosely translatable as: I've definitely never heard of you.

  Brian Stableford

  Names, People, Creative

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• Our awareness is all that is alive and maybe sacred in any of us. Everything else about us is dead machinery.

  Kurt Vonnegut

  Alive, Sacred, Breakfast Of Champions

  "Breakfast of Champions". Book by Kurt Vonnegut, 1973.

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• In a good play, everyone is in the right.

  Christian Friedrich Hebbel

  Play, Fiction Writing, Fiction Writers

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• In writing and politicking, it's best not to think about it, just do it.

  Gore Vidal

  Thinking, Just Do It

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• There is no great writing, only great rewriting.

  Louis D. Brandeis

  Rewriting, Great Writing, Great Writers

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• You can't try to do things; you simply must do them.

  Ray Bradbury

  Thinking Of You, Creativity, Creative

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• My stories run up and bite me on the leg - I respond by writing down everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off.

  Ray Bradbury

  Letting Go, Running, Ideas

  Ray Bradbury (1980). “The Stories of Ray Bradbury”, Alfred a Knopf Incorporated

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• The process of writing has something infinite about it. Even though it is interrupted each night, it is one single notation.

  Elias Canetti

  Night, Literature, Infinite

  "Quote Unquote (A Handbook of Quotations)". Book by M.P. Singh, p. 302, January 1, 2005.

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• The secret of becoming a writer is to write, write and keep on writing.

  Ken MacLeod

  Secret, Becoming

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• When I say work I only mean writing. Everything else is just odd jobs.

  Margaret Laurence

  Mean Girls, Jobs, Odd

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• I don't need an alarm clock. My ideas wake me.

  Ray Bradbury

  Ideas, Design, Needs

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• The reason 99% of all stories written are not bought by editors is very simple. Editors never buy manuscripts that are left on the closet shelf at home.

  John Y. Campbell

  Home, Simple, Editors

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• Observe, don't imitate.

  John M. Ford

  George H. Scithers, Darrell Schweitzer, Isaac Asimov, John M. Ford (1981). “On Writing Science Fiction: The Editors Strike Back”, p.13, Wildside Press LLC

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