All Quotes By Tag: Writers

“I thought about how all that mattered, in all entirety, and all I wanted, and all I could see anything being worth anything for, was being a writer.”

“I now understand that writing fiction was a seed planted in my soul, though I would not be ready to grow that seed for a long time.”

“Though the immediate impression of rebellion may obscure the fact, the task of authentic literature is nevertheless only conceivable in terms of a desire for fundamental communication with the reader.”

“Many people are partial to the notion that . . . all writers are somehow mere vessels for Truth and Beauty when they compose. That we are not really in control. This is a variation on that twee little fable that writers like to pass off on gullible readers, that a character can develop a will of his own and ‘take over a book.’ This makes writing sound supernatural and mysterious, like possession by faeries. The reality tends to involve a spare room, a pirated copy of MS Word, and a table bought on sale at Target. A character can no more take over your novel than an eggplant and a jar of cumin can take over your kitchen.”

“This story was a story of our time. And a writer’s attempts not to fathom his time amount but to sounding his mind in it.”

“Very well then! I’ll write, write write. He let the words soak into his mind and displace all else.A man had a choice, after all. He devoted his life to his work or to his wife and children and home. It could not be combined; not in this day and age. In this insane world where God was second to income and goodness to wealth.”

“But writers experience the world and themselves in a unique way. We look for meaning. We see it even when we are not paying attention, which is seldom because, as writers, paying attention is what we do. We are scribes to the ticking of the days, and we have a job to do. We are not at peace unless we are doing it.”

“Fear is felt by writers at every level. Anxiety accompanies the first word they put on paper and the last.”

“We need writers who fear nothing. (“Our Goal”)”

“Writing romantic fiction is the second chance that loved ones denied us.”

“Humility is an essential quality in writers who want to write well.”

“Good writers are like magpies, attracted to shiny things and storing away treasures -pieces of dialogue and experience – which pop up from memory unexpectedly.”

“He had let me know time after time that he was a thinking man, a man of intellect and wit. Yet one unintended hungry look into my eyes and he betrayed each of his words he had carefully spoken to me. I knew it in that instant. He was a viscerally driven man. And one day, he would possess me.”

“He had a book to finish. Ten-thousand words. The other ninety thousand had been difficult. This last tenth seemed impossible. His plot had become derailed. He was unable to see his way through the smoke and coke dust of a mythical railway track that should stretch ahead. Yes, the characters were there, good and solid. Indeed, the story’s engine was strong and had shunted yet forward and forward, with only one or two sharp halts. But six weeks ago he met the bumpers. R. was now stuck in a deserted station, his progress blocked. (“Out Back”)”

“Happy children do not seem to grow up to be writers.”