“Every successful piece of nonfiction should leave the reader with one provocative thought that he or she didn't have before. Not two thoughts, or five - just one. So decide what single point you want to leave in the reader's mind.” WantShouldMindTwoSuccessfulFivePiecesReaderJust OneNonfictionProvocative Author:William Zinsser
“It is a little out of touch to presume that someone wants to follow your every observation and insight over the course of hundreds of pages without any sort of payoff. That's why writing isn't a one-way street. You have to give something back: an interesting plot, a surprise, a laugh, a moment of tenderness, a mystery for the reader to piece together.” WayWantGivingWritingLittlesMomentsTogetherCoursesInterestingLaughingPiecesMysteryStreetsReaderPagesSurpriseInsightObservationOne WayPlotTendernessPayoff Author:Christopher Bollen
“I like to be aware of a book as a piece of writing, and aware of its structure as a product of mind, and yet I want to be able to see the represented world through it. I admire artists who succeed in dividing my attention more or less evenly between the world of their books and the art of their books . . . so that a reader may study the work with pleasure as well as the world that it describes.” WorldWantWritingMindWellsMayArtBookAbleArtistPleasureAttentionStudyPiecesProductsReaderSucceedStructureAdmireDividing Author:Annie Dillard
“Robert Frost says in a piece of homely doggerel that he has hoped wisdom could be not only Attic but Laconic, Boeotian even - "at least not systematic"; but how systematically Frostian the worst of his later poems are! His good poems are the best refutation of, the most damning comment on, his bad: his Complete Poems have the air of being able to educate any faithful reader into tearing out a third of the pages, reading a third, and practically wearing out the rest.” AbleReadingPiecesAirWorstReaderPagesThirdsFaithfulCommentEducateSystematicFrostHaving HopeAtticsHomelyRefutationLaconic Author:Randall Jarrell
“When modernist poetry, or what not so long ago passed for modernist poetry, can reach the stage where the following piece by Mr. Ezra Pound is seriously offered as a poem, there is some justification for the plain reader and orthodox critic who shrinks from anything that may be labelled 'modernist' either in terms of condemnation or approbation. Better he thinks, that ten authentic poets should be left for posterity to discover than one charlatan should be allowed to steal into the Temple of Fame.” ThinkingShouldMayLongLeftTermPiecesStagePoetReaderFameTenCriticsFollowingStealingTemplesPoundsOrthodoxJustificationLong AgoShrinksPosterityCondemnationCharlatans Author:Laura Riding
“There is no ideal length, but you develop a little interior gauge that tells you whether or not you're supporting the house or detracting from it. When a piece gets too long, the tension goes out of it. That wordtensionhas an animal insistence for me. A piece of writing rises and falls with tension. The writer holds one end of the rope and the reader holds the other endis the rope slack, or is it tight? Does it matter to the reader what the next sentence is going to be?” WritingLittlesLongDoeEndsMatterFallNextHouseAnimalPiecesReaderIdealsSentencesTensionLengthInteriorsRopeInsistenceGaugesRise And FallDoes It Matter Author:John Jeremiah Sullivan
“The key of writing fiction isn't just to remove something that the reader or listener can easily imagine. It's not a matter of being coy, or withholding information. It's allowing for multiple possibilities, recognizing the complexity of human behavior, and making the world of a piece of fiction as marvelously confounding as the world we live in.” WorldWritingHumansMatterFictionPiecesImagineInformationPossibilityKeysReaderBehaviorComplexityRemoveAllowingMultipleListenersHuman BehaviorRecognizingWriting FictionWithholdingConfoundingComplexity Of HumanWithholding Information Author:Peter Turchi
“A piece of art - this goes for a painting or a sculpture or a book or whatever - really shouldn't have to do with the set of expectations that the viewer or the audience or the reader brings to that work. It should just have to do with how they interpret it and whether they like it or not.” ShouldArtBookAudiencePiecesPaintingReaderExpectationsWorking ItViewersSculpture Author:Max Kellerman
“To my way of thinking and working, the greatest service a piece of fiction can do any reader is to force him to lay it down with a higher ideal of life than he had when he took it up.” ThinkingWayForceCan DoFictionPiecesReaderHigherIdealsLaysMy WayWay Of Thinking Author:Gene Stratton-Porter
“Readers must be given room to bring their own emotions to a piece so crammed with emotional content; the writer must tenaciously resist explaining why the material is so moving.” MovingGivenRoomsEmotionPiecesEmotionalMaterialsReaderExplaining Author:William Zinsser
“Reading is one of the most individual things that happens. So every reader is going to read a piece in a slightly different way, sometimes a radically different way.” WayDifferentSometimesHappensReadingIndividualPiecesReaderDifferent Ways Author:Margaret Atwood
“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.” PeopleWritingMeanChallengesKnowingPiecesReaderPureDiscoveryArguing Author:Susan Orlean
“It's insane to be a writer and not be a reader. When I'm writing I'm more likely to be reading four or five books at once, just in bits and pieces rather than subjecting myself to a really brilliant book and thinking, "Well what's the point of me writing anything?" I'm more likely to read a book through when I take a break from writing.” ThinkingWritingWellsBookReadingBitsBreakFivePiecesFourReaderBrilliantInsaneBits And Pieces Author:Markus Zusak
“I read a lot, but at the same time I'm not a particularly good or diligent or discriminating reader. I go through maybe close to a thousand or more books a year, but a lot of times I'll only read bits and pieces of any one individual text.” YearsBookIndividualBitsPiecesReaderThousandDiligentBits And Pieces Author:Dan Chaon
“Books are frozen voices, in the same way that musical scores are frozen music. The score is a way of transmitting the music to someone who can play it, releasing it into the air where it can once more be heard. And the black alphabet marks on the page represent words that were once spoken, if only in the writer's head. They lie there inert until a reader comes along and transforms the letters into living sounds. The reader is the musician of the book: each reader may read the same text, just as each violinist plays the same piece, but each interpretation is different.” IfsWayMayBookDifferentPlayLyingSoundBlackVoicePiecesHeardAirReaderMusicianPagesLettersMarkMusicalScoreInterpretationFrozenAlphabetViolinist Author:Margaret Atwood