Writers need exercise….quotes for writers (and people who like quotes)
Exercise the writing muscle every day, even if it is only a letter, notes, a title list, a character sketch, a journal entry. Writers are like dancers, like athletes. Without … Continue reading
The difference between a lie and a story…Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
A lie was something you told because you were mean or a coward. A story was something you made up out of something that might have happened. Only you didn’t … Continue reading
A bitter lesson for writers – Thomas Wolfe Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
What I had to face, the very bitter lesson that everyone who wants to write has got to learn, was that a thing may in itself be the finest piece … Continue reading
Hilary Mantel on the dangers of writing historical fiction — Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
A relation of past events brings you up against events and mentalities that, should you choose to describe them, would bring you to the borders of what your readers could … Continue reading
Be kind – be anxious, says Roddy Doyle. Quotes for writers (and people who like quotes)
Do be kind to yourself. Fill pages as quickly as possible; double space, or write on every second line. Regard every new page as a small triumph, until you get … Continue reading
Erica Jong – author of the groundbreaking The Fear-of-Flying – on when she was too scared to finish any passage of writing. Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
I went for years not finishing anything. Because, of course, when you finish something you can be judged…I had poems which were re-written so many times I suspect it was … Continue reading
Doris Lessing on the art of reading well — Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
“There is only one way to read, which is to browse in libraries and bookshops, picking up books that attract you, reading only those, dropping them when they bore you, … Continue reading
Margaret Atwood on the problems of knowing what’s going to happen next… Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
You can never read your own book with the innocent anticipation that comes with that first delicious page of a new book, because you wrote the thing. You’ve been backstage. … Continue reading
Terry Pratchett on old women and misleading covers — quotes for writers (and people who like quotes)
I do note with interest that old women in my books become young women on the covers… this is discrimination against the chronologically gifted. Terry Pratchett photo credit: donielle via … Continue reading
A short story is a fiendish device: Sci Fi writer Michael Swanwick — Quotes for Writers (and People who like Quotes)
A short story…can be held in the mind all in one piece. It’s less like a building than a fiendish device. Every bit of it must be cunningly made and … Continue reading
…The supreme expression of story is the novel…Richard Flanagan, winner of 2014 Booker. Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
I do not share the pessimism of the age about the novel. They are one of our greatest spiritual, aesthetic and intellectual inventions. As a species it is story that … Continue reading
When you compete with Shakespeare there’s only going to be one winner….Virginia Woolf Quotes for writers (and anyone who likes quotes)
I read Shakespeare directly I finished writing. When my mind is agape and redhot. Then it is astonishing. I never yet knew how amazing his stretch and speed and word-coining … Continue reading
Writing about women – SALLY WAINWRIGHT Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
Why wouldn’t you put them on screen? I find women more interesting. They’re more heroic. The banality of the day-to-day; the reality of it; coping with the problems on a … Continue reading
The benefits of list-making – Rhodri Marsden Quotes for Writers (and people who like quotes)
Aside from heavy drinking, the creation of lists is the most effective temporary form of anxiety relief that I know of, and, as a bonus, it’s substantially cheaper and results … Continue reading
BRIDGET WHELAN writer 