Best Writing Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings Page 36

“I've got splinters in my nose from the best publishing doors in town.”

Writing Doors Towns Noses Publishing Splinters

Author:Rita Mae Brown

“No man living in a world as interesting as this ever writes a book if he can help it.”

Ifs Men World Writing Book Helping Interesting

Book:Crowds: A Study of the Genius of Democracy and of the Fears, Desires, and Expectations of the People

Source: Crowds: A Study of the Genius of Democracy and of the Fears, Desires, and Expectations of the People

“No judge writes on a wholly clean slate.”

Writing Judging Clean Slate Clean Slate

Author:Felix Frankfurter

“It was very difficult to write about my own country, because I have always been the outsider looking in.”

Writing Country Difficult My Own Outsiders

Author:Asne Seierstad

“As hard as you try to write a good script and you have great intentions, this alchemy has to occur.”

Writing Trying Hard Intention Scripts Alchemy

Author:Carlton Cuse

“I can write orchestrations, but I can't sight-read music and play at the same time. I don't have enough facility.”

Writing I Can Enough Play Sight Facility Orchestration

Author:Elvis Costello

“It's very hard, I think, for critics to write positive reviews, because there's not that much to say about something you like. You can kind of say 'I really like that band' and then if you're forced to fill up the rest of an article, you've got to start saying heady things. It's much easier to say negative things in a review.”

Ifs Thinking Writing Kind Hard Like You Easier Band Negative Critics Reviews Articles

Author:Mitchell Hurwitz

“I have to have music as a soundtrack to writing fiction. I listen to it at other times, too, but it helps me write.”

Writing Helping Fiction Help Me Writing Fiction Soundtracks

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“My parents read to me a lot as a kid, and I started writing very early, probably spurred on by Aesop's fables. Then they gave me The Lord of the Rings way too early for me to fully understand what I was reading, which was actually kind of cool. It was almost better - comprehension's overrated when you're reading.”

Way Writing Kind Kids Reading Parent Lord Rings Comprehension Fables Overrated

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“Angela Carter's fiction blew me away and really instilled a passion for writing, bolstered by Vladimir Nabokov. But in general, I can't point to any one thing. I just always loved books and writing.”

Writing I Can Book Passion Fiction One Thing Carter Angela

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“My best time to write is right after coffee and breakfast - four eggs because, full disclosure: I'm really a komodo dragon - and that's because then I'm energized but not so awake that the critical voice clicks on, the voice that sometimes says, "Don't write that," or "Man, that sentence is terrible - you should give up and go pet the cats."”

Men Giving Should Writing Sometimes Voice Four Terrible Giving Up Cat Critical Sentences Coffee Awake Pet Dragons Eggs Breakfast Clicks Best Times Disclosure

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“A dream inspiring a story is different than placing a description of a dream in a story. When you describe a character's dream, it has to be sharper than reality in some way, and more meaningful. It has to somehow speak to plot, character, and all the rest. If you're writing something fantastical, it can be a really deadly choice because your story already has elements that can seem dreamlike.”

Ifs Way Writing Different Character Stories Dream Reality Seems Choices Speak Elements Meaningful Description Plot

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“The best visual book I can think of is Lynda Barry's What It Is, but although I refer to it all the time it's not a creative writing book per se.”

Thinking Writing I Can Book Creative Visuals Creative Writing

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“The "executive producer" title either means that you're the person who created, or co-created, the show, or you're the person who's in charge of day-to-day operations. Whereas "producer" is often just a writing credit.”

Writing Mean Persons Shows Credit Producers Titles Operations Executives Day To Day

Author:Mitchell Hurwitz

“I believe the best creative writing lessons live in the specifics.”

Writing Believe I Believe Creative Lessons Creative Writing Specifics

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“I've always wrestled with the difference between plot and structure, and after re-reading a lot of writing books I realized I wasn't alone.”

Writing Book Reading Differences Structure I Realized Plot Writing A Book

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“One of the most important things as a writing instructor is to provide a lot of different entry points to subjects. To not impose your own personal experience as the One True Way.”

Way Writing Important Different Subjects Important Things Entry Personal Experiences Instructors

Author:Jeff VanderMeer

“When you have been writing for a lot of years, you have to make an effort not to start repeating yourself. It occurred to me that I tended to tread certain ground automatically, because it was comfortable, but that there were areas I avoided automatically because they made me nervous.”

Writing Years Has Beens Made Certain Effort Comfortable Areas Nervous Avoided

Author:Merrill Markoe

“Okay, this is Fran Lebowitz. She gave an interview once for the Paris Review about trying to write fiction and saying that fiction writers start talking about how characters are talking to them, and it's crazy, she's never had that. And I also thought, I'm never gonna be able to do this, because I didn't feel that for a really long time.”

Feels Writing Trying Long Character Able Fiction Talking Crazy Long Time Okay Paris Interviews Reviews Fiction Writers Really Long

Author:Sloane Crosley

“I really enjoy work to a purpose. Maybe that makes me kind of strange. In some ways - and this is going to sound awful - it could be that writing is the worst job that I've ever had. Because it's so much more important to me and there's so much more opportunity for failure and I have so many people depending on me. In some ways it's the most satisfying, the most gratifying, and the most rewarding job I've ever had. But I actually would say it's probably the worst job I've ever had too.”

People Way Writing Kind Important Jobs Purpose Opportunity Enjoy Sound Worst Strange Awful Satisfying

Author:Patrick Rothfuss

“I have come to understand myself as more of a New York writer, or more of a woman writer, but I don't feel like that while I'm writing. But I think that most New Yorkers would object to calling me a New Yorker. I didn't grow up here.”

Thinking Feels Writing Grows Growing Up New York Objects Calling New Yorkers

Author:Sloane Crosley

“I figure I wrote 37 songs in 20 years, and that's not exactly a full-time job. It wasn't that I was writing and writing and writing and quit.”

Writing Years Jobs Song Figures Quitting Full Time Jobs

Author:Tom Lehrer

“It's a sort of philosophy you cook up for yourself. You probably write things the same as everybody else, but it's your own personal way of saying things.”

Way Writing Philosophy Cooks

Author:Jim Capaldi

“If you have words and want to write music for them, the words hit you with a feeling which you can't really describe in words, and so what you do is to put music to them and in this way you make contact with the words, through the musical thing. It happens when two feelings come together and they do something together and they compliment each other.”

Ifs Way Want Writing Two Feelings Happens Together Musical Contact Compliment

Author:Jim Capaldi

“The living together is very important in a way. It's important for writing. It wouldn't be important if we were like just getting other people's numbers together, we'd just have to meet at rehearsals, but writing is something almost completely different.”

People Ifs Way Writing Important Different Together Numbers Rehearsal Living Together

Author:Steve Winwood

“You can write when you're dyslexic, you just can't read it. But I started writing short stories as a child and I found the short story format a real nice one. I love short stories and I love short documentaries or short films of any kind.”

Writing Kind Children Real Stories Film Found Nice Short Story Documentaries Format Short Love Short Films Dyslexic Writing Short Writing Short Stories

Author:Billy Bob Thornton

“I never wanted to write a book, and people have asked me for years to do it.”

People Writing Years Book Wanted

Author:Billy Bob Thornton

“If you want anybody to have a different voice, you really have to visualize and hear the voices of all these people. Sometimes when I write with specific actors in mind, it helps.”

People Ifs Want Writing Mind Different Sometimes Helping Actors Voice Different Voices

Author:Billy Bob Thornton

“Usually when I'm writing, I kind of know what it is before I start writing and I write stream of consciousness style.”

Knows Writing Kind Consciousness Style Streams Stream Of Consciousness

Author:Billy Bob Thornton

“I'm not really a full-time director, I just like to direct the things that I write because I think I'm going to know it better than someone else.”

Thinking Knows Writing Directors Direct

Author:Billy Bob Thornton

“Television is making, there was in independent film renaissance late '80s through the mid-90's. It was an amazing time. Television is doing that right now. So that's why everybody wants to do it. I mean if you're writing stuff like, you know, Fargo, or True Detective, or any of these things that are on, Breaking Bad, there are no rules in television.”

Ifs Knows Want Writing Mean Film Stuff Television Like You Right Now Late Independent 80s Detectives Renaissance Independent Film Fargo

Author:Billy Bob Thornton

“Writing is like pulling your hair out. You have nothing, and you can't think of anything, but you have to think of something.”

Thinking Writing Hair Pulling

Author:Charlie Day

“A lot of artists use memories. A lot of prose writers, a lot of poets, a lot of songwriters, refer back to something. Generally it's all you've got, unless you're brilliant and can write totally in the now.”

Writing Use Artist Memories Poet Brilliant Prose Songwriters Using Me

Author:Paul McCartney

“I write romance, women's fiction, chicklit. I think it all fits very comfortably under the same umbrella. Basically, I write books for women - books about relationships, books that make you laugh and sometimes make you cry a little.”

Thinking Writing Littles Book Sometimes Romance Fiction Laughing Cry Fit Umbrella Make You Laugh Make You Cry

Author:Susan Elizabeth Phillips

“The love story between the hero and the heroine has to be at the center of the book. I think that's pretty true in my books. I usually write a secondary love story, with maybe nontraditional characters. Sometimes I write older characters. I'm interested in female friendships, and family relationships. So I don't write the traditional romance, where you just have the hero and the heroine's love story. I like intertwining relationships.”

Thinking Writing Book Sometimes Character Stories Romance Hero Female Love Story Traditional Heroines Female Friendship Family Relationship Friendship And Family

Author:Susan Elizabeth Phillips

“I used to write things that might have sounded better coming out of an older person's voice or vision. Hence, "grandpa-boy." I'm an old man, but I'm a boy. A really old boy!”

Men Writing Persons Might Used Voice Vision Boys Old Man Coming Out Grandpa

Author:Paul Westerberg

“In all honesty, I've written movies that have been made, and the process has not been as satisfying as writing for television.”

Writing Has Beens Made Process Written Honesty Television Satisfying

Author:Vince Gilligan

“While I was writing poems, I would often divert myself by reading detective novels, I liked them. And there was a period when I read many of them. I absorbed the form, and I liked it, it was a good one, mostly the hard-boiled school, you know, Chandler, Hammett, and their heirs. That was the direction that interested me most.”

Knows Writing Hard School Form Reading Novel Periods Detectives Heirs Writing Poems

Author:Paul Auster

“I would love to see writing taught online because at university like Yale, there are not enough teachers who are able to teach writing well, or in some cases, there are none.”

Writing Wells Enough Able Teach Cases Teacher Taught University Online Yale Writing Well

Author:David Gelernter

“For me, directing is like writing with meat. I can write live, in real time, and change things and be confident that I'm helping the movie.”

Writing I Can Real Helping Meat Be Confident Time And Change

Author:David Ayer

“Always care for the writing part first. Every good film project starts with good writing. If you have a good script, everything else follows. Writing is crucial.”

Ifs Writing Firsts Care Film Projects Very Good Scripts Crucial Good Writing Good Films

Author:Giovanna Cau

“I've always appreciated people like Graham Parker or Loudon Wainwright III, who spend their entire lives writing songs and working their asses off just to have complete artistic freedom. They're just sharing their lives with you through their music. That's the same kind of work that I'm trying to do, in my own weird way.”

People Way Writing Trying Kind Song My Own Ass Artistic Appreciated Writing Songs Artistic Freedom

Author:Judd Apatow

“Everything you do is so personal. In the end, it doesn't matter so much if you write about your own life or not. It's going to be as much artifice when it comes out as a piece of music. Everything is in character in a way. But that's a great thing.”

Ifs Way Writing Ends Matter Character Pieces Great Things Artifice

Author:Jenny Hval

“This is what I wanted to do from the very beginning: write songs and make records and tour them with a good live band.”

Writing Wanted Song Records Band

Author:Christopher Owens

“[My mom] had always wanted to write a children's book. She was a children's librarian and an elementary school teacher, so of course she loves children and children's literature.”

Writing Children Book Wanted School Courses Literature Teacher Mom My Mom Librarian Children's Books Elementary School Children Love School Teachers Children's Literature

Author:Jenna Bush

“I don't like people who sit on computers all day long and write about people they don't know anything about.”

People Knows Writing Long Computer

Author:Paris Hilton

“I wanna produce, write, and direct my own projects, and eventually fund them. I wanna be a mogul.”

Writing My Own Produce Projects Direct Fund Moguls

Author:Kevin Hart

“I really am enjoying writing more than ever. I feel like I'm so much more focused than I was in the early times.”

Feels Writing Enjoy Focused

Author:Debbie Harry

“I would say that since I was nine years old I've always wanted to write and direct horror movies and action movies. There's never been a time in my life where that wasn't all I wanted to do.”

Writing Years Action Wanted Horror Direct Nine Nine Years Action Movie

Author:Jay Baruchel

“It's exciting to do something you're writing. And it's also a lot easier to memorize because you wrote it.”

Writing Easier Exciting

Author:Jillian Bell

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