Best knowing & writing Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

“Without a doubt my mother was an inspiration for my writing. This is true in many ways, but mostly because she is a wonderful storyteller, without even knowing it.”

Way Writing Inspiration Mother Knowing Doubt Wonderful Storyteller

Author:Elizabeth Strout

“You don't realize what a strain it is on the nerves to write or think-of-writing all day long, and to sleep full of nervous dreams, and to wake up not knowing who one is: this all stems from anxiety about finishing the book, about time 'growing short', etc., and the perpetual strain of invention.”

Source: Windblown World: The Journals of Jack Kerouac, 1947-1954

“I have a certain sensibility that I bring to my writing that comes from knowing two things: what I as a reader like to read, and what as a writer I am capable of. I know my own limits. I know there are things I cannot do.”

Knows Writing Two Certain My Own Knowing Reader Limits Capable Two Things Sensibility

Author:Paullina Simons

“My main goal as a songwriter is to make something that inspires people. To write things about my life that people can relate to. Whether it's a whole record or just one song for someone, I hope it can do that for them. Knowing that I have the ability to do that is inspiring to me.”

People Writing Whole Song Goal Can Do Ability Knowing Records Inspire Relate Just One Songwriters

Author:Kate Voegele

“At night, never go to bed without knowing what you'll write tomorrow.”

Writing Night Knowing Tomorrow Bed Planning

Author:Ernest Hemingway

“But the thing that stands eternally in the way of really good writing is always one: the virtual impossibility of lifting to the imagination those things which lie under the direct scrutiny of the senses, close to the nose. It is this difficulty that sets a value upon all works of art and makes them a necessity. The senses witnessing what is immediately before them in detail see a finality which they cling to in despair, not knowing which way to turn. Thus this so-called natural or scientific array becomes fixed, the walking devil of modern life.”

Source: Kora in Hell: Improvisations

“For all the years I'd spent talking about pictures, the truth was that I had no idea how to draw or what it felt like to do it. I would mistrust a poetry critic who couldn't produce a rhyming couplet. Could one write about art without knowing how to draw?”

Writing Years Art Ideas Felt Talking Knowing Produce Draws Critics No Idea Mistrust Rhyming Couplets

Author:Adam Gopnik

“Writing is a really good first step toward that goal of knowing yourself.”

Writing Firsts Goal Steps Knowing First Steps Know Yourself

Author:Jewel

“The writer is one who, embarking upon a task, does not know what to do... Writing is a process of dealing with not-knowing, a forcing of what and how.”

Knows Writing Doe Process Knowing Tasks Not Knowing Embarking

Author:Donald Barthelme

“I myself am pursuing the same instinctive course as the veriest human animal you can think of I am, however young, writing at random straining at particles of light in the midst of a great darkness without knowing the bearing of any one assertion, of any one opinion. Yet may I not in this be free from sin?”

Thinking Writing Humans May Light Young Courses Sin Animal Opinion Darkness Knowing Midst Particles Assertion Human Animal

Book:The Complete Works of John Keats

Source: The Complete Works of John Keats

“There is freedom in being a writer and writing. It is fulfilling your function. I used to think freedom meant doing whatever you want. It means knowing who you are, what you are supposed to be doing on this earth, and then simply doing it.”

Thinking Want Writing Mean Earth Used Knowing Function Who You Are Supposed To Be Fulfilling Writers And Writing Knowing Who You Are

Author:Natalie

“Nine-tenths of the value of a sense of humor in writing is not in the things it makes one write but in the things it keeps one from writing. It is especially valuable in this respect in serious writing, and no one without a sense of humor should ever write seriously. For without knowing what is funny, one is constantly in danger of being funny without knowing it.”

Should Writing Values Knowing Danger Serious Valuable Nine Sense Of Humor Being Funny

Author:Robert Benchley

“Shirley Jackson said that a confused reader is an antagonistic reader, and I live by that. It's okay to start anywhere, and to let yourself write a big sloppy overly-detailed first draft. You just jump in, knowing that the water will be cold at first, but no one is making you swim.”

Writing Firsts Said Bigs Water Knowing Cold Reader Okay Confused Live By Swim Sloppy

Author:Anne Lamott

“This is the sort of book that justifies fatwahs. If WWIII occurred right now, we could die happy knowing Baxter would never write again. If a dinosaur killing asteroid was headed for Earth and I knew Baxter had another book coming up, I would campaign for letting the rock hit, since it is obviously the work of a benovelent deity trying to save us from another Titan.”

Ifs Writing Trying Book Earth Dies Knowing Rocks Right Now Killing Campaigns Justify Deities Dinosaurs Asteroids Titans

Author:James Nicoll

“If there's a character type I despise, it's the all-capable, all-knowing, physically perfect protagonist. My idea of hell would be to be trapped in a four-hundred page, first-person, first-tense, running monologue with a character like that. I think writers who produce characters along those lines should graduate from high school and move on.”

“Writing is very hard work and knowing what you're doing the whole time.”

Writing Hard Whole Knowing Hard Work

Author:Shelby Foote

“Not to write, for many of us, is to die. We must take ares each and every day, perhaps knowing that the battle cannot be entirely won, but fight we must, if only a gentle bout. The smallest effort to win means, at the end of each day, a sort of victory.”

Ifs Writing Mean Ends Dies Fighting Winning Effort Knowing Victory Battle Gentle Each Day Smallest

Author:Ray Bradbury

“If you write in category, you write knowing there's a framework, there are reader expectations.”

Ifs Writing Literature Knowing Reader Expectations Categories Framework

Author:Nora Roberts

“This manner of writing wherein knowing myself inferior to myself? I have the use, as I may account it, but of my left hand.”

Writing May Use Hands Left Knowing Accounts Inferiors Left Hand Knowing Myself

Author:John Milton

“When you write a book, you want to have fidelity to the character. Characters and their emotions guide the structure of the novel. The author is aware that there's a certain amount of information she/he has to provide in order to satisfy the reader, knowing that she/he has set something up that must be paid off, but this payment must be made while maintaining fidelity to the characters.”

Want Writing Made Book Character Certain Order Emotion Novel Knowing Information Reader Amount Paid Structure Guides Maintaining Payment Fidelity Paid Off

Author:David Bezmozgis

“From the foot of the pyramids I contemplate twenty centuries, buried in the sand. ... I came here to hold on to fleeting life, and I see all about me only death. ... I write this, not quite knowing what I'm saying, but I dry the ink with the dust of Egyptian queens.”

Writing Knowing Feet Century Twenties Dust Queens Dry Sand Buried Contemplating Fleeting Ink Pyramids Egyptian Fleeting Life

Author:Rachel

“You have to understand that people feel threatened by a writer. It's very curious. He knows something they don't know. He knows how to write, and that's a subtle, disturbing quality he has. Some directors without even knowing it, resent the writer in the same way Bob Hope might resent the fact he ain't funny without twelve guys writing the jokes. The director knows the script he is carrying around on the set every day was written by someone, and that's just not something that all directors easily digest.”

People Knows Way Feels Writing Facts Might Guy Quality Know How Knowing Written Directors Jokes Scripts Curious Subtle Twelve Bob Threatened Disturbing Resent

Author:Ernest Lehman

“Sometimes, I don't know that words for things, how to write down the feeling of knowing that every dying person leaves something behind.”

Knows Writing Persons Sometimes Feelings Behinds Knowing Dying

Book:Brown Girl Dreaming

Source: Brown Girl Dreaming

“When I'm happiest writing is just not knowing where it goes and just let the characters bring you there.”

Writing Character Knowing Not Knowing

Author:Martin McDonagh

“A curious thing about written literature: It is about four thousand years old, but we have no way of knowing whether four thousand years constitutes senility or the maiden blush of youth.”

Way Writing Years Literature Knowing Four Written Youth Thousand Curious Thousand Years Maidens Senility

Author:John Barth

“It is absurd to imagine that any child will be able to earn a living, let alone contribute to resolving our world's complex problems, without knowing how to read and write. My foundation supports the National Writing Project so that teachers can be more effective in their efforts to improve literacy for all students.”

World Writing Children Problem Able Effort Support Knowing Teacher Imagine Students Projects Foundation Complexes Absurd Our World Imagine That Literacy Complex Problems

Author:Isabel Allende

“I never get sick of writing my own stories because there's a certain comfort in knowing you will never run out of material. It's relaxing, actually, to write.”

Writing Stories Running Certain My Own Knowing Materials Comfort Sick

Author:Augusten Burroughs

“Before I started working on a computer, writing a piece would be like making something up every day, taking the material and never quite knowing where you were going to go next with the material. With a computer it was less like painting and more like sculpture, where you start with a block of something and then start shaping it.”

Writing Would Be Next Knowing Pieces Painting Materials Computer Block Sculpture Never Quit

Author:Joan Didion

“I'm disciplined about writing. I get up every day knowing I have to produce work. I'm less concerned about other aspects of the job, such as the prizes and promotions. Promoting my work can be awkward, unless I feel sociable enough. Prizes encourage me to work harder on my next project.”

Feels Writing Enough Jobs Next Knowing Produce Hard Work Projects Concerned Aspect Harder Get Up Prize Awkward Promoting Promotion Work Harder Sociable

Author:Sefi Atta

“Part of being a writer is knowing when what you write is really bad.”

Writing Knowing

Author:Reif Larsen

“Writing about unknown people means I spend a lot of time arguing to the reader about why it's worth knowing about them. That's challenging, but then the piece is pure discovery.”

People Writing Mean Challenges Knowing Pieces Reader Pure Discovery Arguing

Author:Susan Orlean

“I got a rejection letter from an editor at HarperCollins, who included a report from his professional reader. This report shredded my first-born novel, laughed at my phrasing, twirled my lacy pretensions around and gobbed into the seething mosh pit of my stolen clichés. As I read the report, the world became very quiet and stopped rotating. What poisoned me was the fact that the report's criticisms were all absolutely true. The sound of my landlady digging in the garden got the world moving again. I slipped the letter into the trash... knowing I'd remember every word.”

“I think people got in touch with me either knowing my work, or probably more frequently just knowing a plot or sort of buzz about something I did and sort of saying, "Get that guy that writes the crazy stuff in here."”

People Thinking Writing Guy Stuff Knowing Crazy Plot That Guy Buzz

Author:Mark Leyner

“One of the things that is always difficult about a collaboration is that you don't necessarily find the same thing funny. And so the challenge becomes, how do you tell the other person that you don't think something's funny? The best collaborations tend to be when you are willing to be told that. But there's also ego involved, and so there's a lot of frustration in knowing that you're writing something, and the other person, on some level, needs to think that it's funny.”

Thinking Needs Writing Persons Difficult Challenges Levels Knowing Willing Involved Ego Frustration Collaboration

Author:Michael Showalter

“I've realized the most effective way to write, for me, is knowing what to throw away.”

Way Writing Knowing

Author:Youth Lagoon

“The ability to name poetry's gestures and rhetorics isn't required to write or read them, any more than a painter needs to know the physics of color to bring forward a landscape. The eye and hand and ear know what they need to know. Some of us want to know more, because knowing pleases.”

Knows Want Needs Writing Hands Eye Names Ability Knowing Color Please Ears Physics Painter Landscape Gestures Rhetoric

Author:Jane Hirshfield

“I actually don't believe that everybody should necessarily try to learn to code. I think it's reasonably specialized, and nobody really expects most people to have to do it. It's not like knowing how to read and write and do basic math.”

People Thinking Should Writing Trying Believe Knowing Don't Believe Math Code

Author:Linus Torvalds

“I never actually do rehearsals. That's one of the reasons that I write those bios and if I can meet with the actors I'll meet them or talk to them on the phone. What I want is for them to come on set knowing their lines and knowing who the character is.”

Ifs Want Writing I Can Reason Character Actors Lines Knowing Phones Rehearsal Bios

Author:John Sayles

“Home is a blueprint of memory...Finding home is crucial to the act of writing. Begin here. With what you know. With the tales you've told dozens of times...with the map you've already made in your heart. That's where the real home is: inside. If we carry that home with us all the time, we'll be able to take more risks. We can leave on wild excursions, knowing we'll return home.”

Ifs Knows Writing Heart Made Real Home Able Memories Knowing Risk Return Findings Tales Maps Crucial Dozen Blueprints Excursions

Author:Georgia Heard

“As a profession, freelance writing is notoriously insecure. That's the first argument in its favor. For many reasons, a few of them rational, the thought of knowing exactly what next year's accomplishments, routine, income, and vacation will be - or even what time I have to get up tomorrow morning - has always depressed me.”

Writing Years Firsts Reason Next Morning Knowing Tomorrow Argument Profession Favors Income Rational Get Up Accomplishment Routine Vacation Insecure Next Year Tomorrow Morning

Author:Gloria Steinem

“You write who you are. But you also cheat, and youwrite what you want to be. It's embarrasing to be the guy who madethe movie, knowing you're not exactly who you want to be.”

Want Writing Guy Knowing Who You Are What You Want Cheat

Author:Paul Thomas Anderson

“Creatures are cups. The sciences and the arts and all branches of knowledge are inscriptions around the outside of the cups. When a cup shatters, the writing can no longer be read. The wine's the thing! The wine that's held in the mold of these physical cups. Drink the wine and know what lasts and what to love. The man who truly asks must be sure of two things: One, that he's mistaken in what he's doing or thinking now. And two, that there is a wisdom he doesn't know yet. Asking is half of knowing.”

Thinking Knows Men Writing Art Two Lasts Asks Half Knowing He Man Drink Creatures Asking Wine Cups Branches Two Things Mistaken Mold Inscriptions

Author:Rumi

“One day, I started writing, not knowing that I had chained myself for life to a noble but merciless master. When God hands you a gift, he also hands you a whip; and the whip is intended solely for self-flagellation... I'm here alone in my dark madness, all by myself with my deck of cards - and, of course, the whip God gave me.”

Writing Self Hands Courses Dark Knowing Masters One Day Madness Noble Cards Not Knowing Whips Deck Chained Deck Of Cards

Author:Truman Capote

“My last point about getting started as a writer: do something first, good or bad, successful or not, and write it up before approaching an editor. The best introduction to an editor is your own written work, published or not. I traveled across Siberia on my own money before ever approaching an editor; I wrote my first book, Siberian Dawn, without knowing a single editor, with no idea of how to get it published. I had to risk my life on the Congo before selling my first magazine story. If the rebel spirit dwells within you, you won't wait for an invitation, you'll invade and take no hostages.”

“I had decided I wanted to write about food, and I knew the only way to do that is to speak with authority, which meant learning the language and knowing what that experience is like.”

Way Writing Wanted Speak Language Knowing Authority Decided

Author:Gail Simmons

“We just keep making the shows that we love, and the good news is that we can never rest on our laurels, knowing that we're going to be on forever. We're constantly challenged to write the very best story that we can, week in and week out, hoping that that will allow us to keep telling more of them.”

Writing Stories Shows Forever Knowing Week News Good News Laurels

Author:Jeff Pinkner

“Knowing what thought process goes into constructing a line helps an actor know how to deliver that line because you understand the intention behind the writing.”

Knows Writing Helping Actors Process Lines Behinds Know How Knowing Intention Thought Process

Author:David Henrie

“We should think about what we mean by literacy. If you say, "He's a very literate person," what you really mean is that he knows a lot, thinks a lot, has a certain frame of mind that comes through reading and knowing about various subjects.The major route open to literacy has been through reading and writing text. But we're seeing new media offer richer ways to explore knowledge and communicate, through sound and pictures.”

“When I write, I lose time. I'm happy in a way that I have a hard time finding in real life. The intimacy between my brain and my fingers and my computer... Yet knowing that that intimacy will find an audience... It's very satisfying. It's like having the safety of being alone with the ego reward of being known.”

Way Writing Real Hard Loses Brain Known Audience Knowing Ego Findings Computer Safety Fingers Rewards Real Life Intimacy Hard Times Satisfying

Author:Jill Soloway

“I know that a lot of songwriters write about a break up. It's a really popular topic. I think heartbreak is the number one thing people write about. I could say that's narcissistic somehow because they want everybody to admire how pained they are. But I actually do think there's something beautiful and uplifting about knowing that you're not the only one who is experiencing or has experienced that kind of devastating loss. Everyone's experienced that.”

People Thinking Knows Want Writing Kind Beautiful Loss Numbers Break Knowing One Thing Admire Uplifting Songwriters Topics Narcissistic Something Beautiful Really Popular Devastating Loss

Author:Mirah

Knowing Quotes

Related topics

Knowing Quotes