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Quotes about writing

377 quotes from 206 people

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Whenever the last trumpet shall sound, I will present myself before the sovereign judge with this book in my hand, and loudly proclaim, thus have I acted; these were my thoughts; such was I.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau1712–1778Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1765-1770; published 1782), Book I
- Character
The pity is the public will demand and find a moral in my book — or worse they may take it in some more serious way, and on the honor of a gentleman, there is not one single serious line in it.
James Joyce1882–1941To Djuna Barnes, in an interview published in Vanity Fair (March 1922)
I believe that world literature has it in its power to help mankind, in these its troubled hours, to see itself as it really is, notwithstanding the indoctrinations of prejudiced people and parties.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn1918–2008Nobel lecture (1970)
- Truth & Lies
Sometimes one’s very angry and preaches, but I know that to clinch a point is to close it. To leave the reader free to decide what your work means, that’s the real art; it makes the work inexhaustible.
Ursula K. Le Guin1929–2018“The magician” by Maya Jaggi in The Guardian (17 December 2005)
- Art
In youth men are apt to write more wisely than they really know or feel; and the remainder of life may be not idly spent in realizing and convincing themselves of the wisdom which they uttered long ago.
Nathaniel Hawthorne1804–1864The Snow-Image, and Other Tales, Preface (1852)
- Wisdom
- Youth
When you consider that there are a thousand ways to express even the simplest idea, it is no wonder writers are under a great strain. Writers care greatly how a thing is said — it makes all the difference.
E. B. White1899–1985Paris Review interview (1969)
If a secret history of books could be written, and the author’s private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader!
William Makepeace Thackeray1811–1863The History of Pendennis (1848-1850), Ch. 42.
- Reading
When I was first in Czechoslovakia, it occurred to me that I work in a society where as a writer everything goes and nothing matters, while for the Czech writers I met in Prague, nothing goes and everything matters.
Philip Roth1933–2018The Paris Review, “The Art of Fiction No. 84”, interview by Hermione Lee (1984)
- Freedom
When one reads any strongly individual piece of writing, one has the impression of seeing a face somewhere behind the page. It is not necessarily the actual face of the writer.
George Orwell1903–1950Charles Dickens (1939)
- Reading
Myth is at the beginning of literature, and also at its end.
Jorge Luis Borges1899–1986“Parable of Cervantes and Don Quixote” (January 1955)
A man may well himself discover truth in what he wrote; for he was dealing all the time with things that came from thoughts beyond his own.
George MacDonald1824–1905The Fantastic Imagination (1893)
I’m going to spend my life writing poems, turning them into music that will affect people and touch their hearts. I’m going to write the songs that people can’t write for themselves.
Stevie Nicksborn 1948Kia Makarechi, “Stevie Nicks On Fleetwood Mac’s Reunion Tour, Rihanna, Kanye West & Her Early Years In Music”, Huffington Post, 3 December 2012
- Music
Don’t avoid the cliches — they are cliches because they work!
George Lucasborn 1944Comment at the Imagineering offices of Disney, on Star Tours simulators (1985), quoted in “The Imagineering Way: Ideas to Ignite your Creativity” (2003) by Marty Sklar
- Advice
Given a choice between being trapped on a desert island with a group of writers or a family of howler monkeys, I think I’d pick the monkeys. At least I could eat them.
Anthony Bourdain1956–2018The Nasty Bits (2006)
- Comedy
The hotel shop only had two decent books, and I’d written both of them.
Douglas Adams1952–2001The Salmon of Doubt (2002)
- Comedy