I grew up in this town, my poetry was born between the hill and the river, it took its voice from the rain, and like the timber, it steeped itself in the forests.
—Pablo Neruda (1904–73) Chilean Poet, Diplomat, Political leader
Be born anywhere, little embryo novelist, but do not be born under the shadow of a great creed, not under the burden of original sin, not under the doom of Salvation.
—Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973) American Novelist, Human Rights Activist
I never know what I think about something until I read what I’ve written on it.
—William Faulkner (1897–1962) American Novelist
Novels as dull as dishwater, with the grease of random sentiments floating on top.
—Italo Calvino (1923–85) Italian Journalist, Short Story Writer, Novelist, Essayist
The moving finger writes, and having written moves on. Nor all thy piety nor all thy wit, can cancel half a line of it.
—Omar Khayyam (1048–1123) Persian Mathematician
Only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language.
—Jane Austen (1775–1817) English Novelist
Practically everybody in New York has half a mind to write a book, and does.
—Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American Actor, Comedian, Singer
A creation of importance can only be produced when its author isolates himself, it is a child of solitude.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
I was brought up in the great tradition of the late nineteenth century: that a writer never complains, never explains and never disdains.
—James A. Michener (1907–97) American Novelist, Short Story Writer, Historian
Sit down and put down everything that comes into your head and then you’re a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff’s worth, without pity, and destroy most of it.
—Colette (1873–1954) French Novelist, Performer
The trouble with writing a book about yourself is that you can’t fool around. If you write about someone else, you can stretch the truth from here to Finland. If you write about yourself the slightest deviation makes you realize instantly that there may be honor among thieves, but you are just a dirty liar.
—Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American Actor, Comedian, Singer
No pen, no ink, no table, no room, no time, no quiet, no inclination.
—James Joyce (1882–1941) Irish Novelist, Poet
If any man wishes to write a clear style, let him first be clear in his thoughts.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Everywhere I go I’m asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don’t stifle enough of them. There’s many a bestseller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.
—Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964) American Novelist
A good writer is basically a story-teller, not a scholar or a redeemer of mankind.
—Isaac Bashevis Singer (1902–91) Polish-born American Children’s Books Writer, Novelist, Short Story Writer
An editor should tell the author his writing is better than it is. Not a lot better, a little better.
—T. S. Eliot (1888–1965) American-born British Poet, Dramatist, Literary Critic
A novelist is, like all mortals, more fully at home on the surface of the present than in the ooze of the past.
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-born American Novelist
Essential characteristic of the really great novelist: a Christ-like, all-embracing compassion.
—Arnold Bennett (1867–1931) British Novelist
The writer who loses his self-doubt, who gives way as he grows old to a sudden euphoria, to prolixity, should stop writing immediately: the time has come for him to lay aside his pen.
—Colette (1873–1954) French Novelist, Performer
Every drop of ink in my pen ran cold.
—Hugh Walpole (1884–1941) English Novelist, Short Story Writer, Dramatist
The hard necessity of bringing the judge on the bench down into the dock has been the peculiar responsibility of the writer in all ages of man.
—Nelson Algren (1909–81) American Novelist, Short Story Writer
Good writing excites me, and makes life worth living.
—Harold Pinter (1930–2008) British Playwright
If you want to be a writer-stop talking about it and sit down and write!
—Jackie Collins (1937–2015) English Romance Novelist
Ten censure wrong, for one that writes amiss.
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744) English Poet
I think of an author as somebody who goes into the marketplace and puts down his rug and says, “I will tell you a story,” and then he passes the hat.
—Robertson Davies (1913–95) Canada Journalist, Playwright, Academic, Critic, Novelist
Democritus plucked his eye out because he could not look at a woman without thinking of her as a woman. If he had read a few of our novels, he would have torn himself to pieces.
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955) American Poet
The writer isn’t made in a vacuum. Writers are witnesses. The reason we need writers is because we need witnesses to this terrifying century.
—E. L. Doctorow (b.1931) American Writer, Editor, Academic
I would love to spend all my time writing to you; I’d love to share with you all that goes through my mind, all that weighs on my heart, all that gives air to my soul; phantoms of art, dreams that would be so beautiful if they could come true.
—Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936) Italian Dramatist, Novelist, Short Story Writer, Author
The traditional novel form continues to enlarge our experience in those very areas where the wide-angle lens and the Cinema screen tend to narrow it.
—Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American Historian, Academic, Attorney, Writer
Good writers are those who keep the language efficient. That is to say, keep it accurate, keep it clear.
—Ezra Pound (1885-1972) American Poet, Translator, Critic
I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.
—Blaise Pascal (1623–62) French Mathematician, Physicist, Theologian
When the characters are really alive before their author, the latter does nothing but follow them in their action, in their words, in the situations which they suggest to him.
—Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936) Italian Dramatist, Novelist, Short Story Writer, Author
A writer needs loneliness, and he gets his share of it. He needs love, and he gets shared and also unshared love. He needs friendship. In fact, he needs the universe. To be a writer is, in a sense, to be a day-dreamer – to be living a kind of double life.
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine Writer, Essayist, Poet
I’m the kind of writer that people think other people are reading.
—V. S. Naipaul (1932–2018) Trinidadian-British Novelist, Short-story Writer
Creative writers are always greater than the causes that they represent.
—E. M. Forster (1879–1970) English Novelist, Short Story Writer, Essayist
There are a thousand thoughts lying within a man that he does not know till he takes up the pen to write.
—William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–63) English Novelist
A writer needs three things: experience, observation, and imagination—any two of which, at times any one of which, can supply the lack of the others.
—William Faulkner (1897–1962) American Novelist
I wrote a poem to the moon
But no one noticed it;
Although I hoped that late or soon
Someone would praise a bit
Its purity and grace forlone,
Its beauty tulip-cool…
But as my poem died still-born,
I felt a fool.
I wrote a verse of vulgar trend
Spiced with an oath or two;
I tacked a snapper at the end
And called it Dan McGrew.
I spouted it to bar-room boys,
Full fifty years away;
Yet still with rude and ribald noise
It lives today.
‘Tis bitter truth, but there you are-
That’s how a name is made;
Write of a rose, a lark, a star,
You’ll never make the grade.
But write of gutter and of grime,
Of pimp and prostitute,
The multitude will read your rhyme,
And pay to boot.
So what’s the use to burn and bleed
And strive for beauty’s sake?
No one your poetry will read,
Your heart will only break.
But set your song in vulgar pitch,
If rhyme you will not rue,
And make your heroine a bitch…
Like Lady Lou.
—Robert W. Service (1874–1958) Scottish Poet, Author
I am always interested in why young people become writers, and from talking with many I have concluded that most do not want to be writers working eight and ten hours a day and accomplishing little; they want to have been writers, garnering the rewards of having completed a best-seller. They aspire to the rewards of writing but not to the travail.
—James A. Michener (1907–97) American Novelist, Short Story Writer, Historian
Never write on a subject until you have read yourself full of it.
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Humorist
I’d rather be a lightning rod than a seismograph.
—Ken Kesey (1935–2001) American Novelist, Essayist, Short Story Writer
Writers must fortify themselves with pride and egotism as best they can. The process is analogous to using sandbags and loose timbers to protect a house against flood. Writers are vulnerable creatures like anyone else. For what do they have in reality? Not sandbags, not timbers. Just a flimsy reputation and a name.
—Brian Aldiss (b.1925) English Novelist
The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible—and achieve it, generation after generation.
—Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973) American Novelist, Human Rights Activist
The circumstance which gives authors an advantage above all these great masters, is this, that they can multiply their originals; or rather, can make copies of their works, to what number they please, which shall be as valuable as the originals themselves.
—Joseph Addison (1672–1719) English Essayist, Poet, Playwright, Politician
Hardly ever can a youth transferred to the society of his betters unlearn the nasality and other vices of speech bred in him by the associations of his growing years. Hardly ever, indeed, no matter how much money there be in his pocket, can he ever learn to dress like a gentleman-born. The merchants offer their wares as eagerly to him as to the veriest “swell,” but he simply cannot buy the right things.
—William James (1842–1910) American Philosopher, Psychologist, Physician
If writers were good businessmen, they’d have too much sense to be writers.
—Irvin S. Cobb (1876–1944) American Humorist, Short Story Writer, Columnist
Rereading this novel today, replaying the moves of its plot, I feel rather like Anderssen fondly recalling his sacrifice of both Rooks to the unfortunate and noble Kieseritsky.
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-born American Novelist
It is worth remembering that every writer begins with a naively physical notion of what art is. A book for him or her is not an expression or a series of expressions, but literally a volume, a prism with six rectangular sides made of thin sheets of papers which should include a cover, an inside cover, an epigraph in italics, a preface, nine or ten parts with some verses at the beginning, a table of contents, an ex libris with an hourglass and a Latin phrase, a brief list of errata, some blank pages, a colophon and a publication notice: objects that are known to constitute the art of writing.
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine Writer, Essayist, Poet
The art of writing is mysterious; the opinions we hold are ephemeral , and I prefer the Platonic idea of the Muse to that of Poe, who reasoned, or feigned to reason, that the writing of a poem is an act of the intelligence. It never fails to amaze me that the classics hold a romantic theory of poetry, and a romantic poet a classical theory.
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine Writer, Essayist, Poet
Can an author with reason complain that he is cramped and shackled if he is not at liberty to publish blasphemy, bawdry, or sedition?; all of which are equally prohibited in the freest governments, if they are wise and well-regulated ones.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
I have used these weeks to revalue values. Do you understand this expression?. When you come right down to it, the alchemist is the most praiseworthy of men: I mean the one who changes something negligible or contemptible into something of value, even gold. He alone enriches, the others merely exchange. My task is quite singular this time: I have asked myself what mankind has always hated, feared, and despised the most.
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German Philosopher, Scholar, Writer
Really, in the end, the only thing that can make you a writer is the person that you are, the intensity of your feeling, the honesty of your vision, the unsentimental acknowledgment of the endless interest of the life around and within you. Virtually nobody can help you deliberately-many people will help you unintentionally.
—Santha Rama Rau (1923–2009) Indian-American Travel Writer
For five months I got up at six o’clock and got dressed by the lamplight. The fire would not yet be on. The house was very cold but I would put on a heavy coat, sit with my feet up to keep them from freezing and with fingers so cramped that I could scarcely hold a pen. I would write my stunt for the day. Sometimes it would be a poem in which I would carol blithely of blue skies and rippling brooks and flowery meads! Then I would thaw out my hands, eat breakfast and go to school. When people say to me, as they occasionally do, ‘Oh how I envy your gift, how I wish I could write as you do’, I am inclined to wonder, with some inward amusement, how much they would have envied me on those dark, cold, winter mornings of my apprenticeship.
—Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874–1942) Canadian Novelist
Justice to my readers compels me to admit that I write because I have nothing to do; justice to myself induces me to add that I will cease to write the moment I have nothing to say.
—Charles Caleb Colton (1780–1832) English Angelic Priest, Writer, Collector
Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.
—E. L. Doctorow (b.1931) American Writer, Editor, Academic
If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn’t brood. I’d type a little faster.
—Isaac Asimov (1920–92) Russian-born American Writer, Scientist
Like all writers, he measured the achievements of others by what they had accomplished, asking of them that they measure him by what he envisaged or planned.
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine Writer, Essayist, Poet
A word is a bud attempting to become a twig. How can one not dream while writing? It is the pen which dreams. The blank page gives the right to dream.
—Gaston Bachelard (1884–1962) French Philosopher, Psychoanalyst, Poet
Style and Structure are the essence of a book; great ideas are hogwash.
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-born American Novelist
There is no longer any such thing as fiction or nonfiction; there’s only narrative.
—E. L. Doctorow (b.1931) American Writer, Editor, Academic
What I have crossed out I didn’t like. What I haven’t crossed out I’m dissatisfied with.
—Cecil B. DeMille (1881–1959) American Film Producer, Film Director, Screenwriter, Actor
It seems that the fiction writer has a revolting attachment to the poor, for even when he writes about the rich, he is more concerned with what they lack than with what they have.
—Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964) American Novelist
Happy is the novelist who manages to preserve an actual love letter that he received when he was young within a work of fiction, embedded in it like a clean bullet in flabby flesh and quite secure there, among spurious lives.
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-born American Novelist
It is not my fault that certain so-called bohemian elements have found in my writings something to hang their peculiar beatnik theories on.
—Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) American Novelist, Poet
They can’t yank a novelist like they can a pitcher. A novelist has to go the full nine, even if it kills him.
—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American Author, Journalist, Short Story Writer
The first essential in writing about anything is that the writer should have no experience of the matter.
—Isadora Duncan (1877–1927) American Dancer, Choreographer
Would you not like to try all sorts of lives—one is so very small—but that is the satisfaction of writing—one can impersonate so many people.
—Katherine Mansfield (1888–1923) New Zealand-born British Author
The role of the writer is not simply to arrange Being according to his own lights; he must also serve as a medium to Being and remain open to its often unfathomable dictates. This is the only way the work can transcend its creator and radiate its meaning further than the author himself can see or perceive.
—Vaclav Havel (1936–2011) Czech Dramatist, Statesman
I have always been a huge admirer of my own work. I’m one of the funniest and most entertaining writers I know.
—Mel Brooks (b.1926) American Film Actor, Screenwriter, Composer, Comedian, Actor
I know nothing about pistols and revolvers, which is why I usually kill off my characters with a blunt instrument or better with poisons. Besides, poisons are neat and clean and really exciting… I do not think I could look a really ghastly mangled body in the face. It is the means that I am interested in. I do not usually describe the end, which is often a corpse.
—Agatha Christie (1890–1976) British Novelist, Short-Story Writer, Playwright
Manuscript: something submitted in haste and returned at leisure.
—Oliver Herford (1863–1935) American Writer, Artist, Illustrator
Only two classes of books are of universal appeal. The very best and the very worst.
—Ford Madox Ford (1873