I never think when I write; nobody can do two things at the same time and do them well.
– Don Marquis
Category: Quotable
Quotable 175
Whether a story is told on the page or on the screen, the same elements are required. You’ve got to have characters you can identify with, and there’d better be trouble brewing somewhere. Whatever these people’s lives have been before, they’re about to change in a big way. That’s what stories are all about.
– Jenny Wingfield
Quotable 174
Writing well isn’t merely a utilitarian skill. It is about developing a rational grace and energy in your conversation with the world around you.
– Verlyn Klinkenborg
Quotable 173
Writing is making sense of life. You work your whole life and perhaps you’ve made sense of one small area.
– Nadine Gordimer
Quotable 172
I think about the characters I’ve created, and then I sit down and start typing and see what they will do. There’s a lot of subconscious thought that goes on. It amazes me to find out, a few chapters later, why I put someone in a certain place when I did. It’s spooky.
– Tom Clancy
Quotable 171
Don’t romanticize your “vocation.” You can either write good sentences or you can’t. There is no “writer’s lifestyle.” All that matters is what you leave on the page.
– Zadie Smith
Quotable 170
The road to hell is paved with works-in-progress.
– Philip Roth
Quotable 169
Very few writers know what they are doing until they’ve done it.
– Anne Lamott
Quotable 168
When I sit down in order to write, sometimes it’s there; sometimes it’s not. But that doesn’t bother me anymore. I tell my students there is such a thing as “writer’s block,” and they should respect it. You shouldn’t write through it. It’s blocked because it ought to be blocked, because you haven’t got it right now.
– Toni Morrison
Quotable 167
Writing well is difficult, but one can always write something. And then, with a lot of work, make it better.
– Thomas Mallon