Writing quotes
30.7K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside writing — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"To write a poem you must have a streak of arrogance-- not in real life I hope. In real life try to be nice. It will save you a hell of a lot of trouble and give you more time to write."
"Writing is just work-there's no secret. If you dictate or use a pen or type or write with your toes-it's still just work."
"Do not write merely to be understood. Write so you cannot possibly be misunderstood."
"Maybe the example of Southern fiction writing has been so powerful that Southern poets have sort of keyed themselves to that."
"If the stuff you're writing is not for yourself, it won't work."
"If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There's no way around these two things that I'm aware of, no shortcut."
"I write a very rough first draft of every chapter, then I rewrite every chapter. I try to get it down in the first rewrite, but some chapters I can't get quite right the third time. There are some I go over and over and over again."
"The manual for WordStar, the most popular word-processing program, is 400 pages thick. To write a novel, you have to read a novel - one that reads like a mystery to most people. They're not going to learn slash q-z any more than they're going to learn Morse code. That is what Macintosh is all about."
"I have come to understand that life is too complex and much too short to let amateurs direct the story. I would rather let the Master Storyteller do the writing."
"What do you want from me? Fine writing? Or do you want to see the sales curve stop moving down and start moving up?"
"In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every other word you have written; you have no idea what vigor it will give your style."
"Letter writing was clearly important to Reagan. Even as president he kept dashing off letters to friends, pen pals, media people, statesmen, critics, and the kind of people who write to presidents never expecting a reply."
"The story you are afraid to write is usually the one you are meant to tell."
"We'll keep writing and if it hits our standards we'll go with it. We're not here to destroy anything. It's as precious to us as it is for someone who's followed us for years."
"The great body of physical science, a great deal of the essential fact of financial science, and endless social and political problems are only accessible and only thinkable to those who have had a sound training in mathematical analysis, and the time may not be very remote when it will be understood that for complete initiation as an efficient citizen of one of the new great complex worldwide States that are now developing, it is as necessary to be able to compute, to think in averages and maxima and minima, as it is now to be able to read and write."
"People spend a lifetime thinking abouthow they would really like to live. I asked my friends and no one seems to know very clearly. To me, it's very clear now. I wish my life could have been like the years when I was writing 'Love in the Time of Cholera.'"
"Ability is nothing without opportunity."
"I write my own songs. I made my own videos. I pick my producers. Nothing goes out without my permission. It's all authentic."
"I first started writing fiction in college because I was attracted to beautiful sentences. I loved to read them. I wanted to write them."
"Although I enjoyed writing Film Music it was always a means to an end, in that it enabled me to keep a wife and family and write my classical music, which has always been my passion."
