For Writers Quotes

#1. There is a long tradition in China for writers and journalists to take pen names, partly as protection from retaliation by authorities. If Facebook requires the use of real names, that could potentially put Chinese citizens in danger.

Michael Anti

#2. Crime fiction makes money. It may be harder for writers to get published, but crime is doing better than most of what we like to call CanLit. It's elementary, plot-driven, character-rich story-telling at its best.

Linwood Barclay

#3. It's not unusual for writers to look backward. Because that's your pool of resources. If you were to write something now, I bet there's a pretty good chance you'd call on your teenage years, your experiences then, stuff you learned then.

Paul McCartney

#4. Writers perform the so-called counterfactual thinking all the time. All the time. For most people, counterfactual thingking is a habit, but for writers, it is a necessity

Ika Natassa

#5. Readers don't work for writers. They work for themselves.

Mohsin Hamid

#6. It has always been very difficult for writers to survive commercially in India because the market was so small. But that's not true at all any more. It's one of the world's fastest growing and most vibrant markets for books, especially in English.

Aravind Adiga

#7. It's difficult for writers in the theatre. It's difficult for writers in the theatre.

Donna McKechnie

#8. Philosophers write for professors; thinkers for writers.

Emile M. Cioran

#9. Science fiction offers an intensely bracing angle of view for writers to adopt, especially in a time of constant innovation and crisis, and it is a scandal that in 1999 so many writers have written it and continue to write it in obscurity.

John Clute

#10. An excellent precept for writers: Have a clear idea of all the phrases and expressions you need, and you will find them.

Ximenes Doudan

#11. I have every sympathy for writers. It's a mystery to me what they do. I can edit. I can cross out and say, 'I'm not saying that' or, 'How about we move this to here? Wouldn't that make that bit of the story better?' But where any of it comes from is beyond me. I will never write a play or a novel.

Alan Rickman

#12. I think the term 'conceptual art' is a useful term for writers, a basket to put people in, like Pop Art or Impressionism or whatever.

John Baldessari

#13. What to do Before Your Book Launch is the new invaluable tool for writers. There is so much to know and now it's all in one place.

Julie Klam

#14. LEARN FROM THE MASTERS:
Mark Twain once said, "Show, don't tell." This is an incredibly important lesson for writers to remember; never get such a giant head that you feel entitled to throw around obscure phrases like "Show, don't tell." Thanks for nothing, Mr. Cryptic.

Colin Nissan

#15. I have a lot of respect for people who are great at ad-libbing and for writers and directors who are able to create a scene in which that works. Judd Apatow is fantastic at it. But as an audience member, I like the sound of something that's been written - I like it to sound written.

Aaron Sorkin

#16. A writer writes for writers, a non-writer writes for his next-door neighbor or for the manager of the local bank branch, and he fears (often mistakenly) that they would not understand or, in any case, would not forgive his boldness.

Umberto Eco

#17. Attention and focus are essential skills for writers in a noise-filled world.

Anne H. Janzer

#18. I found this quote for writers on Twitter:
There is a fine line between confidence and delusional thought; cross it.
Don't know who wrote it but thought it was interesting.

Robin Glasser

#19. Quotes from the Underground is a remarkable resource and must-read for writers, researchers, activists and indeed anyone who embraces progressive values and hopes to rescue politics from corporate control.

Joel Bakan

#20. It's also not unusual for writers to look backward. Because that's your pool of resources.

Paul McCartney

#21. Scrivener is where I live. I'm planning the next novel, two screenplays and a couple of short stories with it and it's amazing how fluid the software makes the process. I genuinely think this is the biggest software advance for writers since the word processor.

Michael Marshall Smith

#22. To write, I think one must sit in one place and be bored. Boredom is a very good state for writers to be. Things cook away in your head when you're bored, and suddenly one day, you have a book or a germ of a book.

Neel Mukherjee

#23. I think that if there can be considered racism it's to do with the lack of opportunities for writers and producers and the people behind the camera.

Denzel Washington

#24. The reason that war is such a fascinating subject for writers is because it's a revealer. Put a bunch of people in an adrenaline-fuelled, life-or-death situation and their fundamental behaviours are exposed, the scrim is taken away and the motivations behind each personality come out to play.

Sloane Crosley

#25. Special-interest magazines are dangerous places for writers to start out in because the writing quickly falls into a routine and people are likely to find themselves artistically exhausted when they want to work on something of their own.

Irwin Shaw

#26. I think it's fairly common for writers to be afflicted with two simultaneous yet contradictory delusions, the burning certainty that we're unique geniuses, and the constant fear that we're witless frauds who are speeding toward epic failure.

Scott Lynch

#27. While apartheid was in operation, the set-up was a gift for writers if you were looking for a big theme.

Damon Galgut

#28. To reconstruct stories and scenes, nonfiction writers must conduct vigorous and responsible research. In fact, narrative requires more research than traditional reportage, for writers cannot simply tell what they learn and know; rather, they must show it.

Lee Gutkind

#29. When words lose their meaning, physical force takes over.

from an essay for Writers by Nancy Crampton

W. H. Auden

#30. Fiction is risky for writers also in that the process of making certain books, of shaping certain narratives, leaves scars and marks on your inner life.

Chris Abani

#31. My best advice for writers is: Have your adventures, make your mistakes, and choose your friends poorly - all these make for great stories.

Chuck Palahniuk

#32. I think for writers who write that kind of stuff, they want to make changes. Look at Kris Kristofferson and Dylan. I mean, whole generations come along liking that stuff and that's great.

Lee Hazlewood

#33. I just have a thing for writers. Maybe it because I'm just so not a writer.

Patricia Clarkson

#34. I think speculative fiction has fewer unspoken prerequisites than literary fiction for writers of color.

Nnedi Okorafor

#35. Despite the fact that he loves books and owns a bookstore, A.J. does not particularly care for writers. He finds them to be unkempt, narcissistic, silly, and generally unpleasant people. He tries to avoid the ones who've written books he loves for fear that they will ruin their books for him.

Gabrielle Zevin

#36. I wonder sometimes if the motivation for writers ought to be contempt, not admiration.

Orson Scott Card

#37. I have a huge respect for writers and realise that this is not an area that I find easy. I doubt that I would have the patience in front of a blank sheet of paper to become a writer.

Jenny Agutter

#38. If there is a special Hades for writers is would be in the forced contemplation of their own works.

John Dos Passos

#39. It used to be for writers that that six seasons and a movie thing, that's the holy grail as writers - your series goes eight, 10 seasons, you're set for life.

Noah Hawley

#40. Not being sure of things, he knew, was a charmless corner of purgatory reserved for writers who were driving fast with no idea at all where they were going.

Stephen King

#41. Luckily for writers - and unluckily for history - every scientific idea creates human conflict.

Scott Westerfeld

#42. Television and cable have become the new independent films, in a sense, for writers and actors to gravitate towards. That's why I like short films, too; I love doing readings, audio books, working with young filmmakers; anything that keeps you from getting blase about yourself or in a rut.

Campbell Scott

#43. Columbia is ... for people whose genitals still work, dammit. For writers who want to be brave and persevere in the real world where people often fail.

Scott Kenemore

#44. I'm always impressed when seeing how much admiration people show for writers that died centuries ago, and as much as I am shocked when they totally ignore me, right in front of them.

Robin Sacredfire

#45. Acting can be a difficult business. When I was younger, if my mates were doing better than me, I might be a little bit envious, but as I have got older, I love to see actors cracking on and succeeding. The same goes for writers.

Max Beesley

#46. I always wanted to create a site that was sports and pop culture. '30 for 30' had a big impact because I loved how that was about finding, empowering and working with these incredible directors, and I thought the same thing could work for writers.

Bill Simmons

#47. Having a support system is huge for writers. My parents were always encouraging and told me they were behind me, whether or not I made it in the business. My wife was always there for my successes and failures.

Stephen J. Cannell

#48. Heinlein's Rules for Writers
Rule One: You Must Write
Rule Two: Finish What Your Start
Rule Three: You Must Refrain From Rewriting, Except to Editorial Order
Rule Four: You Must Put Your Story on the Market
Rule Five: You Must Keep it on the Market until it has Sold

Robert A. Heinlein

#49. 'Monty Python' and 'The Simpsons' have ruined comedy for writers for the rest of our lives.

Scott Adsit

#50. What is The Subconscious to every other man, in its creative aspect becomes, for writers, The Muse.

Ray Bradbury

#51. It takes awhile for writers to get to know actors rhythms, not just as actors, but what they bring to the characters. I think it takes a few episodes for the writing room to catch up to the actors and vice versa.

Logan Marshall-Green

#52. For writers from working-class families, the making of art is cultural disenfranchisement, for we do not belong in literary circles and our writing rarely makes it back home.

Valerie Miner

#53. There is no such thing as writer's block for writers whose standards are low enough.

William Stafford

#54. It's always a mistake for writers to key their submissions to world events, because they move so quickly and unpredictably, as has certainly proven the case in Afghanistan.

Richard Curtis

#55. Poetry is a tool for writers to create literature in different forms of expression and messages.

Vanessa M Chattman

#56. I was a boarding school product from the age of eight, and I hated it. Though I do have a theory that boarding school is good training for writers because it's so desperately lacking in privacy: you make space for yourself by having an interior life.

Simon Mawer

#57. The great wisdom for writers, perhaps for everybody, is to come to understand to be at one with their own tempo.

Alan Hollinghurst

#58. It's masturbation for writers to be able to write this absolutely outrageous personality, in a character that you somehow agree with, part of the time, at least.

Rie Rasmussen

#59. Books are the ultimate way for writers to reach immortality.

Iris Chang

#60. I think people underestimate the value of collaboration, especially for writers.

Akiva Goldsman

#61. You get more out of doing a web series than a pilot, in some ways, especially when we were interviewing for writers. They had already seen what our show looked like, rather than something that we wrote that doesn't get picked up and they never see it.

Jillian Bell

#62. For writers, handing a manuscript off to an editor is like walking into a parole hearing. You've done the time but wonder if it's going to satisfy the judge.

Shandy L. Kurth

#63. The academy is an incredibly sheltered world, and I do think it's important for writers to get out from under that shelter, at least for a while, to see what the world looks like from outside it.

Garth Greenwell

#64. Prison always has been a good place for writers, killing, as it does, the twin demons of mobility and diversion

Dan Simmons

#65. The many magazines, ranging from pulp to slick, that used to serve as both farm teams for writers and lures to readers, with hundreds of short stories every month, don't exist. Most of the doors for new people have been sealed.

Donald E. Westlake

#66. Most of us can now record a whole series with the click of a button. We all have DVD players, and the rise of the DVD box-set means we watch this stuff in two, three-hour sessions. So there is this real appetite out there for lengthy, pretty intricate drama. All that is great news for writers.

Ted Danson

#67. This is the first lesson for writers - or anyone - who conducts interviews: If you want someone to talk, you've got to know how to listen. And good listening is a surprisingly active process. The interviewee is your focus of attention; you are there to hear what he says and thinks, exclusively.

Lee Gutkind

#68. I have a tremendous respect for writers who scribble away their torments, and their passions into plays.

Rob Urbinati

#69. The only way for writers to meet is to share a quick peek over a common lamp-post.

Cyril Connolly

#70. Don't wait for writers to be dead to be read; the living ones can use the money.

Thomas C. Foster

#71. Research is a wonderful word for writers. It serves as excuse for EVERYTHING

Rayne Hall

#72. A good rule for writers: do not explain overmuch.

W. Somerset Maugham

#73. The time has come for writers, especially those who are artists, to admit that in this world one cannot make anything out, just as Socrates once admitted it, just as Voltaire admitted it.

Anton Chekhov

#74. The first and most important thing of all, at least for writers today, is to strip language clean, to lay it bare down to the bone.

Ernest Hemingway,

#75. For writers - even sportswriters - bad news is always easier than good, since it is, after all, more familiar.

Richard Ford

#76. Saturday night is perfect for writers because other people have plans.

Mike Birbiglia

#77. The Shield made me realize there were great opportunities for writers in TV.

Nick Antosca

#78. I think it's very important for writers and artists generally to be witnesses to the world, and to be transparent. To let other people speak ... to travel ... to experience the world. And memorialize it.

Joyce Carol Oates

#79. Cats are dangerous companions for writers because cat watching is a near-perfect method of writing avoidance.

Dan Greenburg

#80. For writers, so much is done in isolation. It can be easy to feel detached, or to get a little lost along the way.

Brad Listi

#81. My advice for writers is to get a good day job. It takes the pressure off writing if you have a job that pays the bills.

Abraham Verghese

#82. Telluride has an incredible history and reputation, and I've long known of it as a unique entity that makes a place for writers - one more aspect of this exceptional film festival in the Colorado Alps.

Rachel Kushner

#83. For writers and artists, it's always a balancing act between wanting to be the center of attention and wanting to be invisible and watch what's going on.

Kate Christensen

#84. So if I were talking to a young writer, I would recommend the cultivation of extreme indifference to both praise and blame because praise will lead you to vanity, and blame will lead you to self-pity, and both are bad for writers.

John Berryman

#85. My dream as a producer is to be able to build a company that can be a safe haven for artists, for directors and for writers and actors to do what they do best and let them have final edit. I'd like to build something to that effect.

Brittany Murphy

#86. Today, there are more opportunities for writers in terms of access to larger success, but it's more difficult to publish a literary novel in the lower ranges. In other words, you almost have to hit a home run. You can hit a triple, maybe, but nobody's interested in a single.

James Lee Burke

#87. Many people don't know that New Jersey is a fertile breeding ground for writers, some of them quite renowned. And I would wager that most would be truly startled to learn that the star in the Jersey firmament is - drum roll here - Newark.

Sharon Kay Penman

#88. The blog is certainly another tool for writers out there to break their way in. But being a blogger does not make you a great writer.

Julie Powell

#89. I have great respect for writers who are humble, whose language allows the reader to see the story but doesn't get in the way. Language is a window, and if the window is clean, you shouldn't be aware you're looking through glass.

Jennifer Haigh

#90. Max said little. His essential quality was always to say little, but by powerful empathy for writers and for books to draw out of them what they had it in them to say and to write.

A. Scott Berg

#91. The whole ecosystem of celebrity has broken down for writers. If you go back to the '50s, '60s, and '70s, writers were on TV a lot, and they were allowed to misbehave a lot.

James Wolcott

#92. The process of writing a book has given me a whole new reverence for writers. Mechanically, it is a brutal process; emotionally, it's incredibly healing.

Cory Booker

#93. Movie studios could learn a thing or two from British publishers. There is an intelligence, and a respect for writers; things that you hope for and never get in Hollywood.

Terry Hayes

#94. In neither taste nor precision is any man's practice a court of last appeal, for writers all, both great and small, are habitual sinners against the light; and their accuser is cheerfully aware that his own work will supply ... many 'awful examples' ...

Ambrose Bierce

#95. There is a tendency for writers to be most exciting by whatever they just wrote. Sometimes that excitement is warranted. Sometimes on further listen it's not as good as something they did a couple of years ago, but it's just not in their sights at that particular time.

Stone Gossard

#96. I think it's essential for writers to be involved in the recording process as things can often go wrong in this area. Voice actors are all too often presented with a wad of XL sheets, no proper character notes, context or reference and are just expected to perform.

Rhianna Pratchett

#97. This is for writers yet to be published who think the uphill climb will never end. Keep believing. This is also for published writers grown jaded by the process. Remember how lucky you are.

Terry Brooks

#98. For writers: If you polish a book too much, it'll be flat and shiny and smooth
and not too interesting. It's the little pits and bumps and whatnot that show voice and make a book unique from all the other super shiny flat surfaces

Lori Foster

#99. I do think Austin is a great town for writers; we have a lot of them here. But I grew up in Austin, and so I didn't move here because it was a creative mecca; I was just lucky to live here.

Jeff Abbott

#100. We've never had a giant circulation. And we've always been a magazine for writers and for sophisticated readers. We've never had to run stories that would appeal to a million people. And what you end up with is a kind of tradition that might have staying power - the cockroach after armageddon.

Lorin Stein