Notable Quotes by Authors

I happened to be doing some surfing the other day (can’t you just picture me hanging ten in some totally narly surf?) and came across a web site that had a list of quotes from well known authors. I decided to share some of them with my friends...

‘Everyone walks past a thousand story ideas a day. The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them. Most people don’t see any’ – Orson Scott Card

It is the writer who might catch the imagination of young people, and plant a seed that will flower and come to fruition’ – Isaac Asimov

The only thing I was fit for was to be a writer, and this notion rested solely on my suspicion that I would never be fit for real work, and that writing didn't require any. – Russell Baker

It took me fifteen years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up because by that time I was too famous – Robert Benchley

If you have other things in your life -- family, friends, and good, productive day work -- these can interact with your writing and the sum will be all the richer. – David Brin

If you write one story, it may be bad; but if you write a hundred, you have the odds in your favour. – Edgar Rice Burroughs.

It is perfectly okay to write garbage--as long as you edit brilliantly. – C J Cherryh

My task...is, by the power of the written word to make you hear, to make you feel - it is, before all, to make you see. That - and no more - and it is everything. – Joseph Conrad

Never throw up on an editor. – Ellen Datlow

There is no mistaking the dismay on the face of a writer who has just heard that his brain child is a deformed idiot. – L. Sprague de Camp

People on the outside think there's something magical about writing, that you go up in the attic at midnight and cast the bones and come down in the morning with a story, but it isn't like that. You sit in front of the typewriter and you work, and that's all there is to it. – Harlan Ellison

It begins with a character, usually, and once he stands up on his feet and begins to move, all I can do is trot along behind him with a paper and pencil trying to keep up long enough to put down what he says and does. – William Faulkner

When writing a novel, that’s pretty much entirely what life turns into: 'House burned down. Car stolen. Cat exploded. Did 1500 easy words, so all in all it was a pretty good day.' – Neil Gainman

Half of being smart is knowing what you're dumb at. – David Gerrold

Asking a working writer what he thinks about critics is like asking a lamppost how it feels about dogs. – Christopher Hampton

To be a writer is to sit down at one's desk in the chill portion of every day, and to write; not waiting for the little jet of the blue flame of genius to start from the breastbone - just plain going at it, in pain and delight. To be a writer is to throw away a great deal, not to be satisfied, to type again, and then again, and once more, and over and over.... – John Hersey

It is advantageous to an author that his book should be attacked as well as praised. Fame is a shuttlecock. If it be struck at one end of the room, it will soon fall to the ground. To keep it up, it must be struck at both ends. – Samuel Johnson

James Blish told me I had the worst case of "said bookism" (that is, using every word except said to indicate dialogue). He told me to limit the verbs to said, replied, asked, and answered and only when absolutely necessary. – Anne McCaffrey

We do not write because we want to; we write because we have to. – Somerset Maugham

Prune what is turgid, elevate what is commonplace, arrange what is disorderly, introduce rhythm where the language is harsh, modify where it is too absolute. – Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, circa 65 A.D.

Engrave this in your brain: EVERY WRITER GETS REJECTED. You will be no different. – John Scalzi

The first chapter sells the book; the last chapter sells the next book. – Mickey Spillane

As for the adjective, when in doubt leave it out. – Mark Twain

No one can write decently who is distrustful of the reader's intelligence or whose attitude is patronizing. – E. B. White

I never want to see anyone, and I never want to go anywhere or do anything. I just want to write. – P. G. Wodehouse

And a few of my favourites ...

A blank piece of paper is God's way of telling us how hard it to be God. – Sydney Sheldon

All writing comes by the grace of God – Ralph Waldo Emerson

First, find out what your hero wants, then just follow him – Ray Bradbury

‘Books aren’t written, they’re rewritten – including your own. It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the 7^th rewrite hasn’t quite done it’ -- Michael Chrichton

‘I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by’ – Douglas Adams

http://www.logicalcreativity.com/jon/quotes.html#c