“You keep working on your piece over and over, trying to get the sections and paragraphs and sentences and the whole just right, but there's a point at which you can tell you've begun hurting the work with your perfectionism. Then you have to release the work to new eyes.” WritingTryingWholeEyeHurtPiecesSentencesReleaseSectionsPerfectionismParagraphNew Eyes Author:Anne Lamott
“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
“Your whole life and the story of your journey is the landscape picture on the front of the box of a 1,000 piece puzzle. The pieces are each a small sticky note that ends in mid-sentence. You simply need to figure out where each one starts and ends.” NeedsWritingEndsWholeStoriesPiecesJourneyFrontsFiguresNotesBoxesSentencesWhole LifeLandscapePuzzlesSticky Author:Ashly Lorenzana
“Every piece of writing starts from what I call a grit a sight or sound, a sentence or happening that does not pass away but quite inexplicably lodges in the mind.” WritingMindDoeSoundPiecesHappeningsSightSentencesGritPassing AwayLodges Author:Rumer Godden
“I always look for a "rhythm" in my writing. A cadence to the sentences. Sometimes I think of pieces I write in a song writing infrastructure - i.e., a verse, a chorus that I return to, a bridge that's something differenct, a chorus that I return to.” ThinkingWritingLooksSometimesSongPiecesReturnSentencesRhythmBridgesVersesInfrastructureChorusCadence Author:Mitch Albom
“Novels are almost like music or poetry - they just come to me in simple sentences, whereas I think my pieces get more and more complex ever since I've started using a computer.” ThinkingSimpleNovelPiecesComputerComplexesSentences Author:Joan Didion
“The writer learns to write, in the last resort, only by writing. He must get words onto paper even if he is dissatisfied with them. A young writer must cross many psychological barriers to acquire confidence in his capacity to produce good work-especially his first full-length book-and he cannot do this by staring at a piece of blank paper, searching for the perfect sentence.” IfsWritingFirstsBookLastsYoungPerfectPiecesProducePaperCapacityCrossesSentencesPsychologicalStaringAcquireBarriersLengthBlankGood WorkResortsDissatisfiedYoung WritersBlank Paper Author:Paul Johnson
“Wanting to know absolutely what a story is about, and to be able to say it in a few sentences, is dangerous: it can lead us to wanting to possess a story as we possess a cup... A story can always break into pieces while it sits inside a book on a shelf; and, decades after we have read it even twenty times, it can open us up, by cut or caress, to a new truth.” KnowsBookStoriesAbleBreakPiecesCuttingDangerousTwentiesSentencesDecadesCupsShelvesCaress Book:Meditations from a Movable Chair Source: Meditations from a Movable Chair
“When I visit schools and talk to students about writing, I give them one word of advice and I give it to them quickly and loudly-FINISH! Starting something is easier than finishing it. You must have discipline to go from a few sentences, to a few paragraphs, to a piece of writing that has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Finishing something bridges the difference between someone who has talent and one who does not. My best advice? Apply the seat of your pants to the seat of your chair-and finish. FINISH!” GivingWritingDoeEndsSchoolDifferencesPiecesMiddleAdviceTalentStudentsDisciplineEasierStartingSentencesBridgesSeatsChairsPantsOne WordFinishingParagraphBest AdviceWords Of AdviceFinishing It Author:E. L. Konigsburg
“Be yourself. Above all, let who you are, what you are, what you believe shine through every sentence you write, every piece you finish.” WritingBelieveKidsPiecesPositiveEthicsWho You AreShiningIndividualitySentencesStorytellingBeing YourselfBe YouBe True To YourselfTrue To YourselfJust Be YourselfJust Being YouInspirations Being YourselfShining Through Author:John Jakes
“Take a report. It's dry, the sentences are clunky and unfelicitous, they're just conveying information. But it seems to me that if you're fully engaged in a great piece of literature, once you enter the rhythms of the language, which is a kind of music, meanings are being conveyed that you're not fully aware of. They enter into your subconscious.” IfsKindSeemsLiteratureLanguagePiecesInformationSentencesRhythmEngagedDryReportsSubconsciousConveying Author:Paul Auster