Top 100 If You Want To Write Quotes
#1. If you want to give the devil a message, write it on the bottom of your shoes.
Andrew Wommack
#2. TV's not the problem, and I'm tired of it being posed as this antithesis to creativity and productivity. If TV's getting in your way of writing a book, then you don't want to write a book bad enough.
Andrea Seigel
#3. You can write and visualize goals all you want, but if you do not take action, your goals will never become a reality. To obtain a goal you have never before achieved will require tasks you have never before done.
Cameron C. Taylor
#4. If you ever want to know why I'm not on a record label, look at 'The X Factor!' Honestly, of all the people that strive to break barriers in music and do good things and write great lyrics, not one of them would ever pass the first round on any of these competitions.
John Lydon
#5. Don't fall into the trap of having to have everything perfect to write or wait until the mood strikes you. If you want it as a job, treat it like a job, and just as you don't go to work only when you feel like it, you have to condition yourself to sit and write even when the ideas don't flow.
Kim Harrison
#6. Either you write songs or you don't. And if you do write songs like I do, I think there's a natural desire to want to make records.
Roger Waters
#7. If your life is a blank page, that only means you have room to write your story. You have the power to tell that story the way you want to.
Thea Harrison
#8. All the definitions people want to put on you in terms of what kind of writer you are come with hidden meanings. If you're writing science fiction, you're writing rocket ships. If you write dystopian fiction, it's inequity where The Man must be fought.
Paolo Bacigalupi
#9. If you want to know what you look like, look into a mirror. If you want to know how you think, you should write
Dennis Prager
#10. I don't write books for people to be friends with the characters. If you want to find friends, go to a cocktail party.
Zoe Heller
#11. I always figured it was best if I write my songs, take them to my publisher and just lay back. There used to be so many things going on - getting to the artist, getting to the publishers - you know, politics. I just didn't want to get mixed up in all of that.
Otis Blackwell
#12. Writers are a savage breed, Mr. Strike. If you want life-long friendship and selfless camaraderie, join the army and learn to kill. If you want a lifetime of temporary alliances with peers who will glory in your every failure, write novels.
Robert Galbraith
#13. I paraphrase Aristotle: If you want to be comical, write about people to whom the audience can feel superior; if you want to be tragical, write about at least one person to whom the audience is bound to feel inferior, and no fair having human problems solved by dumb luck or heavenly intervention.
Kurt Vonnegut
#14. If you want to write anything that works, you have to go with the grain of your talent, not against it. If your talent is inert and sullen in the face of business or politics ... but takes fire at the thought of ghosts and vampires and witches and demons then feed the flames, feed the flames.
Philip Pullman
#15. Let's not talk about it any more, but if you still want anything please write to me about it, because I can say what I mean much better on paper.
Anne Frank
#16. By encouraging the critic in themselves (the hater) they have killed the artist (the lover).
Brenda Ueland
#17. If you want to change the world, pick up your pen and write.
Martin Luther
#18. You want the book to be special, and they are not always going to be special, but at least you want that to be the ambition. So the only way that happens is if you are not pressing to write a book.
Michael Lewis
#19. I do sit down every day and make myself write. I want 2,000 words every day or 3 single-space pages a day. I think if you are on a deadline, you have to be disciplined. If you turn things in late, you will find yourself without a contract.
Michelle Moran
#20. I learned early on that if you don't want your memos to get you in trouble someday, just don't write any.
Dick Cheney
#21. If you want to be a poet, you can just write it on a napkin, and it's the length of the napkin, I guess. But usually you decide you'll rhyme it, or you'll have a formula. In radio, that's something called, 'Close your eyes and listen.'
Robert Krulwich
#22. I would say if you want to write, write what you care about. I think that's the most important thing. I think if you write what you care about, you stand a better chance of having the reader care about your story.
Jerry Spinelli
#23. Now, I know some women have issues with their bodies. Maybe you've got a little extra junk in the trunk? Get over it. Doesn't matter. Naked kicks Modest's ass every single time. Men are visual. We wouldn't be fucking you if we didn't want to look at you. You can write that down if you like.
Emma Chase
#24. There is no substitute for practical experience, and if you want to write about people you ought to put down that comic book and go out and meet some of them rather than studying the way that Stan Lee or Chris Claremont depict people.
Alan Moore
#25. You should not do an autobiography if you want to tell the truth. There are a lot of things I know about people. If I can't say something good about a person, I don't want to say anything. And since I don't want to say anything bad, I won't write a book.
Abraham A. Ribicoff
#26. One thing that worried me was how writers get categorized and so they end up having to write the same kind of book again and again. That is fine if it is what you want to do, but I would rather be locked in the trunk of my car with a weasel than write the same book every three years until I die.
Justin Cronin
#27. If you want to write a novel about our world now, you'd better write science fiction, or you will be doing some kind of inadvertent nostalgia piece; you will lack depth, miss the point, and remain confused.
Kim Stanley Robinson
#28. I know, if I am playing well, I can be as good as anyone, and I want to show people who write you off and forget about you.
Alan Smith
#29. It's amazing, if you know what you want to say, how fast it is to write.
Evan Davis
#30. If you're in a country and you want to learn about it, it's a good idea to go and found out what they have to say for themselves; you might want to write a good story about it, when they're not looking.
Marion Davies
#31. If you don't care about science enough to be interested in it on its own, you shouldn't try to write hard science fiction. You can write like Ray Bradbury and Harlan Ellison as much as you want.
Frederik Pohl
#32. The dictator says "You are allowed to think as you want" but never write it down or talk about it. If you cross these borders we cannot guarantee your security
Bangambiki Habyarimana
#33. Ah men, why do you want all this attention? I can write poems for myself, make love to a doorknob if absolutely necessary. What do you have to offer me I can't find otherwise except humiliation? Which I no longer need.
Margaret Atwood
#34. But if you want to be in a band and write music, then you should just be in a band and write music.
Adam Jones
#35. If you want life-long friendship and selfless camaraderie, join the army and learn to kill.
If you want a lifetime of temporary alliances with peers who will glory in your every failure, write novels.
- Robert Galbraith (J.K. Rowling)
The Silkworm
J.K. Rowling
#36. If you want to write, then write; if you don't want to write, then don't write. I fell into the former category, and I just made the decision that I'd keep on because I liked it and might someday do something decent.
Ben Fountain
#37. If you want to do your version, go off and write it. You bring your knowledge to it, and you can use that to shape it and color it, but it's someone else's version of that character. You're not actually playing the real person.
Jared Harris
#38. Finally, if you want to write, you have to just shut up, pick up a pen, and do it. I'm sorry there are no true excuses. This is our life. Step forward. Maybe it's only for ten minutes. That's okay. To write feels better than all the excuses.
Natalie Goldberg
#39. Often kids in a computer lab learn about word-processing, but if they want to write an essay, they write it by hand. This is exactly the opposite of what you want them to learn. They're approaching the computer as just another abstract school subject.
Seymour Papert
#40. I don't actually talk about my books much, because I find if I talk about them I don't want to write them anymore. I write to find out what happens. You know how you read a book? That's what I'm doing except I'm just doing it a lot slower because it takes a lot longer to do.
Charles De Lint
#41. I remember telling my creative writing teacher that you never want to have a journal, because if you lose it, then someone's going to know all your secrets. And then she stopped using a journal, but I always write everything down ... Anytime I travel, I try and fill up notepads.
Garrett Hedlund
#42. And no, I don't mind if you want to write me again. Even if you do it in one of those kitten-hanging-from-a-tree cards. ~Lincoln
Katie McGarry
#43. I don't talk very well. With writing, you've time to get it right. Also I've found the more I talk the less I write, and if I didn't write no one would want me to talk anyway.
Alan Bennett
#44. If you want to write for T.V. and movies, you will be subjected to kind and unkind criticism. You had better get used to it and develop a shell.
Anne Beatts
#45. If you just write the kinds of stories you think others will want to read, you'll be competing with cartoonists who are far more enthusiastic for that kind of comic than you are, and they'll kick your ass every time.
Scott McCloud
#46. I don't want somebody who writes like me [in my writing staff]. Because I can write like me. I know what I'm capable of and what my limitations are. If you're going to build an orchestra, you don't want all tubas - you want a violin and you want a cello and you want a drum set.
Tom Fontana
#47. If you want to be a calligrapher, write, and write, and write.
Idries Shah
#48. If you're a songwriter, you want to write a song like "Oh Yeah" that radically shifts everything. You can definitely retire on that song. You want to have something you can put in your songbook that everybody can recognize, whether it's a good or bad thing.
Margaret Cho
#49. Ojiisan says if you want to understand a people, look at their language. The words write the history, not the other way around.
Leza Lowitz
#50. Come on guys, let's be serious. If you really want to do something, don't just 'like' this post. Write that you are ready, and we can try to start something" [Mustafa Nayyem quoted in Chrystia Freeland, "Euromaidan, Kiev: A Place Becomes A Movement"].
Catie Marron
#51. Write what you want to read. The person you know best in this world is you. Listen to yourself. If you are excited by what you are writing, you have a much better chance of putting that excitement over to a reader.
Robin McKinley
#52. If you want to write something that will change the world, write the things that won't stay unwritten.
Kate Bartolotta
#53. Why do you want to become an author? I will accept only one answer. If it is because you feel you can write better than you can do anything else then go ahead and do it without frills and flourishes. Stick to your present job and write in your spare time: but do it as if it is a whole time job.
Ngaio Marsh
#54. If you were to die tomorrow, what would you want people to say about you?
Write it down. That is your personal vision statement.
Unknown
#55. The first rule in keeping secrets is nothing on paper: paper can be lost or stolen or simply inherited by the wrong people; if you really want to keep something secret, don't write it down.
Thomas Powers
#56. If you have a book to write, write it. If you want to record an album, record it. No need to wait for someone in a cubicle halfway across the country to decide if you're worthy.
Seth Godin
#57. And I don't want to begin something, I don't want to write that first sentence until all the important connections in the novel are known to me. As if the story has already taken place, and it's my responsibility to put it in the right order to tell it to you.
John Irving
#58. There is no trick to it. If you like to write and want to write, you write, no matter where you are or what else you are doing or whether anyone pays any heed.
E.B. White
#59. Never let your dreams die! If you want to write then write. Never be put off by people who think they know better than you do.
Have confidence to keep on going!
Millie Aveyard
#60. We want to be famous as a writer, as a poet, as a painter, as a politician, as a singer, or what you will. Why? Because we really don't love what we are doing. If you loved to sing, or to paint, or to write poems, if you really loved it you would not be concerned with whether you are famous or not.
Jiddu Krishnamurti
#61. I want to advise this people, if the Lord ever does give you an inspiration, for heaven's sake write it down and remember it.
J. Golden Kimball
#62. Nothing makes you happy in life except love... Neither the books you write or cites you see... I am very lonely... If I say that I want to be here in this city close to you until the end of my life would you believe me?
Orhan Pamuk
#63. I still think that of all the people doing top fiction today, John D. MacDonald is the best.He was my model as a kid. If there are people out there that want to write, all you need to do is read 20 of his stories to get an idea what it takes to make a story kick over.
Stephen King
#64. If you want to write the next great novel, but you think, No, this won't work because no one will buy it or it won't be any good, then you talk yourself out of taking a risk.
John Tesh
#65. Writing is pretty flexible work, don't you think? If you want to surf, you just have to get a lot done when the waves are lousy. That's what I'm always telling myself, anyway - write while the surf's down!
William Finnegan
#66. I write what I want and how I want. Reviews do not need to be condescending nor do they need to tell me to read your book (if you're a fellow author). Either you like the books or you don't. That's all there is to it.
Amanda Byrd
#67. [Ernest ]Hemingway always said, "Write about what you know." I think you can do that, and if you want to write about what you don't know, you can. It just takes a lot more work.
William T. Vollmann
#68. If you want to write, practice writing. Practice it for hours a day, not to come up with a story you can publish, but because you long to learn how to write well, because there is something that you alone can say.
Ann Patchett
#69. Whatever you have a passion for, then you must do. If you want to write, write about something you know about.
Jackie Collins
#70. When you write things down, you commit to doing them. If you simply tell me what you want to do, there is really no commitment to getting it done.
David Cottrell
#71. I spent several years acquiring the obsessive, day-to-day discipline that's needed if you want to write professionally, then several more, highly valuable years studying fiction writing at the University of Iowa.
John Dalton
#72. Writing is a bit like swimming. You learn writing by doing it and you learn swimming by doing it. Nobody learns how to swim by reading a book about swimming and nobody learns how to write by reading a book about writing. If you want to learn how to write, write a lot and you will get better at it.
Robert Munsch
#73. The records are black boxes for me. Like, if you want to know who I am, my views, my perspective, things I love, things I hate, my convictions, my anthems. I've never let people's opinions affect the way I write.
Katy Perry
#74. If you told me to write a love song tonight, I'd have a lot of trouble. But if you tell me to write a love song about a girl with a red dress who goes into a bar and is on her fifth martini and is falling off her chair, that's a lot easier, and it makes me free to say anything I want.
Stephen Sondheim
#75. you want to write well, write prolifically. If you want to write prolifically, write habitually. If you want to write habitually, learn how to have fun with the process. And if you want to learn how to have fun with the process, pay attention to what's working for you and what isn't.
Anonymous
#76. Word of advice, sister mine. If you want to keep your papers private, don't write 'Private' on the cover. It set the mater right off. It was all I could do to stop her sniffing around like some great sniffing thing.
Lauren Willig
#77. As anyone who has read 'Sports Illustrated's Steve Rushin knows, it's quite possible to write an unreadable column without being a TV pundit. But if you want to be a consistently good columnist, you can't be on television.
Stephen Rodrick
#79. Sometimes if there's a book you really want to read, you have to write it yourself.
Ann Patchett
#80. Besides, if you want to write something perfect, write a haiku. Anything longer is bound to have a few passages that don't work as well as they might.
Philip Pullman
#81. If you want to say you got to take a woman out to a fancy restaurant, I write songs about hey I'm not taking you to a fancy restaurant, I wanna take you to McDonald's.
Kool Keith
#82. You can't write good characters if you can't imagine what it's like being in another person's skin. And if you can imagine that, you naturally want other people's lives to be better. You want to make that happen.
Patrick Rothfuss
#83. I want to be clear about this. If you wrote from experience, you'd get maybe one book, maybe three poems. Writers write from empathy.
Nikki Giovanni
#84. If you want to write what the world is about, you have to write details ... real life is in the dishes. Real life is pushing strollers up the street, folding T-shirts, the alarm clock going off early and you dropping into bed exhausted every night. That's real life.
Anna Quindlen
#85. I continue to write. It's just one of those things that I do. I'll have periods when I write and periods when I don't. But you don't want it to become a discipline really. If it becomes a discipline, it becomes a chore and that's no good.
Greg Lake
#86. Newsweek never hired women as writers and only one or two female staffers were promoted to that rank no matter how talented they were ... Any aspiring journalist who was interviewed for a job was told, If you want to be a writer, go somewhere else
women don't write at Newsweek.
Lynn Povich
#87. Writing does for me what you got in that glass does for you. If I can write about it, I can understand it. And I can put it in the ground. That's all I want to do.
Michael Connelly
#88. The old adage is, 'Write what you know.' But if you only do that, your work becomes claustrophobic. I say, 'Write what you want to know.'
Julia Glass
#89. If you want to be a professional writer then you need to write consistently. Inspiration strikes about once every blue moon which, for me, is once every two and a half to three months, which is when I'll get really and truly inspired about something.
Christopher Paolini
#90. If you want to write about life, you have to write about death.
Marty Rubin
#91. There is no excuse. If you want to write, write.This is your life, you are responsible for it.You will not live forever.Don't wait. Make the time now.
Natalie Goldberg
#92. I don't want to write every week, it's too much trouble, and I shall only write when I want something. If you think I'm sick when I don't write, you can send for me to come and tell you.
Robert Gould Shaw
#93. I have no courage to write much unless I am written to. I soon begin to think that there are plenty of other correspondents more interesting - so if you all want to hear from me you know the conditions.
George Eliot
#94. It's not easy. I got lots of rejections when I first started out. If you want to write, you have to believe in yourself and not give up. You have to do your best to practice and get better.
Rick Riordan
#95. The key thing is, don't worry about if anyone is reading you or not. Figure out your voice and figure out what you want to write about, what you're good at, what you like doing.
Will Leitch
#96. A writer writes. If you want to be a writer, write.
Regina Brett
#97. If it's commercial fiction that you want to write, it's story, story, story. You've got to get a story where if you tell it to somebody in a paragraph, they'll go, "Tell me more." And then when you start to write it, they continue to want to read more. And if you don't, it won't work.
James Patterson
#98. You have to take your ego out of it and say, do I want people to be obsequious to me or do I want to write good books? If it's the latter, you have to take criticism. It's annoying, but that's how to do good stuff; listen to other people.
Denise Mina
#99. Assuming you can write clear English sentences, give up all worry about communication. If you want to communicate, use the telephone.
Richard Hugo
#100. So, for instance, if you came to me, I'd ask, 'Do you want to write? Do you want to improvise? Why do you want to play this instrument? What do you want to do?'
Ornette Coleman
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