Writing quotes
Welcome to our collection of quotes on the topic of Writing. Writing is a powerful form of self-expression that has the ability to captivate, inspire, and connect people from all walks of life. Whether you are a seasoned author, a budding writer, or simply someone who appreciates the beauty of words, you'll find something to resonate with in this collection.
Writing allows us to delve into the depths of our thoughts, emotions, and experiences, transforming them into a tangible and relatable form. It is a tool that transcends time and space, offering us glimpses into different cultures, perspectives, and ideas. From the works of literary giants to the musings of everyday individuals, writing has the power to shape our understanding of the world.
Within this compilation, you'll find a wealth of wisdom, insight, and inspiration from renowned authors, poets, journalists, and more who have shared their thoughts on the art of writing. Explore the quotes that celebrate the beauty of language, the struggle of finding the right words, the thrill of crafting a story, and the catharsis that comes with expressing oneself through writing.
So, whether you're seeking motivation to pen your own masterpiece or simply in need of some words to ponder, we invite you to immerse yourself in the world of Writing through this collection of carefully curated quotes.
Kathryn Stockett
— NovelistIt can be really powerful to write something when youre sad.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorOne of the qualities of writing that is not much stressed is its problem-solving aspect, having to do with the presentation of material: how to structure it, what sort of sentences (direct, elliptical, simple or compound, syntactically elaborate), what tone (in art, "tone" is everything), pacing. Paragraphing is a way of dramatization, as the look of a poem on a page is dramatic; where to break lines, where to end sentences.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterLet others pride themselves about how many pages they have written; I'd rather boast about the ones I've read.
Sarah Vowell
— AuthorNo one I know actually reads what I write, so thank heavens for you strangers.
Tommy Smothers
— ComedianProfessor Irwin Corey had some of the best timing in the world, and that is something you can't steal. He talked nonsense, not punch-lines, per se. It was a great performance thing he did and his timing was impeccable. Pat Paulsen was a master of comedy too. The Smothers Brothers' strength was not in the content, but how it was said. We had a couple of our albums, including the Purple Onion album, translated in script form. It didn't work at all. It is no wonder that writers had a hard time writing for the Smothers Brothers, because they wrote impressions, but there was something else.
Antonio Machado
— PoetIn order to write poetry, you must first invent a poet who will write it.
Peter Temple
— Acclaimed Australian Crime Fiction AuthorIn writing, I'm totally anti-plans of any kind. All my attempts to plan and plot novels have come to grief, and in expensive ways.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsLife is like writing with a pen. You can cross out your past but you can't erase it.
Russell Hoban
— Versatile Author & Creative StorytellerThe first thing I would say to young writers is, "Don't do it, unless you can't stand not to do it." And the second thing I would say is, "If you do do it, and get into it, the constant rule you should have in mind is to explore your material." It sounds simple, but it isn't, because people often want to get from A to B, and they don't stop to look at what is in the material.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesComics are stories; they're like novels or anything else. So the first thing you have to do is become a good storyteller.
Harvey Mackay
— Business Guru & Motivational SpeakerPale ink is better than the most retentive memory.
M. F. K. Fisher
— Pioneering Food WriterA writing cook and a cooking writer must be bold at the desk as well as the stove.
Aisha Tyler
— American actress, comedian, director, and talk show hostI started out being a stand up and writing my own material. That took me to Talk Soup, where I was writing and performing for TV. So everything is all the same job in my eyes, and I don't want to ever give up any part of it. I will say that stand-up is my first love; it's how I got started and is in my bones.
Chadwick Boseman
— American actorI love all types of music. Jazz, classical, blues, rock, hip-hop. I often write scripts to instrumentals like a hip-hop artist. Music inspires me to write. It's either music playing or completely silent. Sometimes distant sound fuels you. In New York there's always a buzzing beneath you.
Quinn Shephard
— American actress, film director, producer, screenwriter and film editorI love music. I think music is a big inspiration; I listen to it a lot when I'm writing. I really love cinematic music. A lot of the time, I make playlists for my characters when I act. I also make playlists for the scripts that I write.
Neil Patrick Harris
— American actor, singer, writer, producer, and television hostIf I wrote a musical it wouldn't be about me. Although I do some magic, so it would probably be about a magician who appeared and re-appeared all over the place.
Ed McBain
— American author and screenwriterReaders are what it's all about, aren't they? If not, why am I writing?
Reba McEntire
— American country music singer, actress and businesswomanFor no. 1, it's great writing, super writing. The second thing is that it's great chemistry with all the actors. We just all got along from the very start. Very get-go, we all got along. We just - it was just like we were all meant to be there together.
Peter Robinson
— British-born Canadian crime writerI used to write my own versions of famous tales, such as William Tell or Robin Hood, and illustrate them myself, too. When I entered my teens, I got more into horror and science fiction and wrote a lot of short stories. A literary education complicated things and for many years I wrote nothing but poetry. Then I got back to story-telling.
Eli Roth
— American film director, producer, and actorI have the infinite galaxy from '2001 as my screensaver - so if I space out while I'm writing and it goes to screensaver, I can just stare off into the stars.
Adriana Trigiani
— American NovelistI write novels about women, except for one: 'Rococo', about a man, a New Jersey decorator. But even that book had a woman on the cover.
Abi Morgan
— Welsh PlaywrightAll work is a process of failure. Every single thing I write, I look at it and go, 'Do better. That's not good enough. Do better.' And so, that keeps me up at night.
Kathryn Stockett
— NovelistMother calls up the stairs to ask what in the world I'm typing up there all day and I holler down, 'Just typing up some notes from the Bible study. Just writing down all the things I love about Jesus.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorSometimes I stumble upon a wonderfully irresistible to me voice, unexpectedly.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterA 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.
Sarah Vowell
— AuthorIf I'm still wistful about On the Road, I look on the rest of the Kerouac oeuvre--the poems, the poems!--in horror. Read Satori in Paris lately? But if I had never read Jack Kerouac's horrendous poems, I never would have had the guts to write horrendous poems myself. I never would have signed up for Mrs. Safford's poetry class the spring of junior year, which led me to poetry readings, which introduced me to bad red wine, and after that it's all just one big blurry condemned path to journalism and San Francisco.
Peter Temple
— Acclaimed Australian Crime Fiction AuthorIn everything I've written, the crime has always just been an occasion to write about other things. I don't have a picture of myself as writing crime novels. I like fairly strong narratives, but it's a way of getting a plot moving.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsUse the smallest word that does the job.
Russell Hoban
— Versatile Author & Creative StorytellerI'll never retire. They'll have to take my computer out of my cold, dead hands. I'm addicted to writing. I feel physically unwell if I'm not doing it.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesThe only advice anybody can give is, if you wanna be a writer, keep writing. And read all you can, read everything.
M. F. K. Fisher
— Pioneering Food WriterI wrote like a junkie. I had to have my daily fix.
Aisha Tyler
— American actress, comedian, director, and talk show hostOne thing we do really well on Archer and one thing I've always tried to do in my comedy and my writing and my podcast is to never speak down to my audience.
Chadwick Boseman
— American actorI started out as a writer and a director. I started acting because I wanted to know how to relate to the actors. When people ask me what I do, I don't really say that I'm an actor, because actors often wait for someone to give them roles.
Neil Patrick Harris
— American actor, singer, writer, producer, and television hostI don't care about my "impact" - I only care about the theater as an art form and criticism as an act of writing.
Ed McBain
— American author and screenwriterI enjoy what I do every minute of the day, even when the going gets tough. When I first began writing, I used to work at a desk in the bedroom, of a small development house. My three sons all under the age of 3 would come running in and out of the room every minute.
Eli Roth
— American film director, producer, and actorOnce I got over the fear of writing female characters, it actually came quite easily and I was really happy with it. I just thought about girls I knew really, really well and I'd just have conversations with them and tried to relay how they talk about certain things.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorIt's impossible to read a distinctive stylist like Faulkner, Joyce, Kafka, Mann, Woolf, James - and many more - without wanting to write, however entirely different one's writing will be.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterWriting is nothing more than a guided dream.
Sarah Vowell
— AuthorI probably am a cranky writer, but I am actually a fairly nice, normal person. Since I'm a grouchy writer, of course I have friends whose books are doing way better than mine.
Peter Temple
— Acclaimed Australian Crime Fiction AuthorAs far as I am concerned, I write novels, and other people can do the labelling.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsThe best writing is rewriting.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesI'm just somebody who tries to write things that entertain people. And if I can do it in a way that makes them prefer to emulate the good guy than the bad guy, I'm happy.
M. F. K. Fisher
— Pioneering Food WriterI wrote from the time I was four. It was my way of screaming and yelling, the primal scream. I wrote like a junkie, I had to have my daily fix.
Ed McBain
— American author and screenwriterI never take ideas from the headlines. I feel that if a story is good enough, a real story that is, then it's already been covered by the media, and if it's not good enough, why would I want to bother with it?
Eli Roth
— American film director, producer, and actorI have so many different projects, I hear voices in my head - the characters talking all at once - and I have to write to make them stop.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorMy first love was reading, which inspired me to write.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterWriting long books is a laborious and impoverishing act of foolishness: expanding in five hundred pages an idea that could be perfectly explained in a few minutes. A better procedure is to pretend that those books already exist and to offer a summary, a commentary.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsSemi-colons only prove that the author has been to college.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesWhen writing, I model all the heroes after myself. Of course, it's hard to make them quite as wonderful as I am, but I come as close as I can.
M. F. K. Fisher
— Pioneering Food WriterI honestly believe that everything I know about the writing of non-fiction (or writing) could be engraved on the head of a pin with a garden hoe.
Ed McBain
— American author and screenwriterI wanted to be an artist. I was studying art. I wanted to be a great painter. When I went into the Navy, there wasn't much to draw at sea. So I began writing, and I began reading a lot.
Eli Roth
— American film director, producer, and actorI've realized that I can't multitask in the writing department; I can only kind of do one thing at a time.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorI feel a terrible loss when I (eventually must) complete a work of fiction.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterAny time something is written against me, I not only share the sentiment but feel I could do the job far better myself. Perhaps I should advise would-be enemies to send me their grievances beforehand, with full assurance that they will receive my every aid and support. I have even secretly longed to write, under a pen name, a merciless tirade against myself.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsI admire anybody who has the guts to write anything at all.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesTo me, writing is fun. It doesn't matter what you're writing, as long as you can tell a story.
Ed McBain
— American author and screenwriterIts a matter of style. The Evan Hunter style and the Ed McBain style are very, very different.
Joyce Carol Oates
— Author"Politics" per se is absent from my writing but there is usually a moral (if ironic) compass.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterThe two important facts I should say, are emotion, and then words arising from emotion. I don't think you can write in an emotionless way. If you attempt it, the result is artificial. I don't like that kind of writing. I think that if a poem is really great, you should think of it as having written itself despite the author. It should flow.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsA writer should concern himself with whatever absorbs his fancy, stirs his heart, and unlimbers his typewriter. ... A writer has the duty to be good, not lousy: true, not false; lively, not dull; accurate, not full of error. He should tend to lift people up, not lower them down.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesIf you're going to write something, that's going to be read by people, a lot of people, you hope it will not only entertain them but maybe do them some good in some way.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorWriting allows for fictitious voices - the voices of persons unlike myself - that might otherwise be muted.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterBeyond my anxiety, beyond this writing,
the universe waits, inexhaustible, inviting.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsNo one can write decently who is distrustful of the reader's intelligence or whose attitude is patronizing.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesSome people are able to not only entertain the public in any way that they can but also in some way to throw in some sort of inspirational message with the entertainment. I have always tried to do that with whatever I wrote. And I'm sure that a lot of other writers do, too.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorReading yields a wish to write, I think, except if the reading is dull and uninspiring.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterI do not write for a select minority, which means nothing to me, nor for that adulated platonic entity known as ‘The Masses’. Both abstractions, so dear to the demagogue, I disbelieve in. I write for myself and for my friends, and I write to ease the passing of time.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsWriting is an act of faith, not a trick of grammar.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesIf you're writing about a character, if he's a powerful character, unless you give him vulnerability I don't think he'll be as interesting to the reader.
Joyce Carol Oates
— AuthorWriting! The activity for which the only adequate bribe is the possibility of suicide, one day.
Jorge Luis Borges
— WriterA writer - and, I believe, generally all persons - must think that whatever happens to him or her is a resource.
E. B. White
— Versatile Writer & Author of Beloved ClassicsThere is nothing harder to estimate than a writer's time, nothing harder to keep track of. There are moments—moments of sustained creation—when his time is fairly valuable; and there are hours and hours when a writer's time isn't worth the paper he is not writing anything on.
Stan Lee
— Comic Book Icon & Creator of Marvel HeroesI never tried to write for other people. I liked people who had problems I might have, because we all have insecurities, regrets. I like heroes who were not 100-percent perfect, who things to take care of.
Joyce Carol Oates
— Authorthe art of reading hardly differs from the art of writing, in that its most intense pleasures and pains must remains private, and cannot be communicated to others.