Top 100 Quotes About Simple Writing
#2. Sure, it's simple writing for kids ... just as simple as bringing them up.
Ursula K. Le Guin
#3. A simple [writing] style is the result of very hard work.
William Zinsser
#4. It has taken me years of struggle, hard work, and research to learn to make one simple gesture, and I know enough about the art of writing to realize that it would take as many years of concentrated effort to write one simple, beautiful sentence.
Isadora Duncan
#5. Your writing should be filled with simple complexities and complex simplicities. Because that is life.
Christy Hall
#6. It took a while to find a passion for another career that was as strong as the passion that I had for football. Once I found it in acting, it was simple. Use the tools you were given from playing football and apply it to your new passion. I have done that through acting, producing and writing.
Maurice Hall
#7. Having read several prize-winning novels, Fancy was confident that she now knew the recipe:
1. Write a simple narrative.
2. Make a long list.
3. Scatter the contents of your list throughout your narrative.
Jaclyn Moriarty
#8. The assumption that simple = stupid. But it's not true; indeed, I find from personal experience that the stupidest writers are the ones whose writing is positively baroque in form.
John Scalzi
#9. Observing people. A spark of idea for a story sometimes comes from the simple act of observation.
Ika Natassa
#10. Stories that pander to your every readerly desire and whim are like overly loyal dogs that live for the simple glow of your approval. I'm a cat person. I like a little aloofness in my pets and my writing.
Alden Bell
#11. I grew up writing thank-you notes. Real, honest-to-goodness, pen-and-ink, stamped and posted letters. More than simple habit, it's about what the commitment to expressing your thoughts and feelings in writing says about the character of the writer. About the joy such notes bring to the reader.
Taylor Mali
#12. Amazing, really, to think of what a man could achieve with the simple ability to put pen to paper and spin a decent yarn.
Graham Moore
#13. Before you go to bed, write down three 'gratefuls' for the day and three 'did wells' (they can even include something as simple as doing the laundry)-the results can be amazing!
Carol Burnett
#14. Historians desiring to write the actions of men, ought to set down the simple truth, and not say anything for love or hatred; also to choose such an opportunity for writing as it may be lawful to think what they will, and write what they think, which is a rare happiness of the time.
Walter Raleigh
#15. A writing teacher once told me that the most successful movies and books were simple plots about complex characters. You should be able to articulate your concept in a couple of lines.
James Scott Bell
#16. A successful story always offers its audience more than a simple resolution of events. A story offers a dramatic affirmation of human needs that are acted out to resolution and fulfillment. Even when that resolution and fulfillment are dark, the journey can still be vivid, potent and illuminating.
Bill Johnson
#17. So far as love or affection is concerned, psychologists have failed in their mission. The little we know about love does not transcend simple observation, and the little we write about it has been written better by poets and novelists.
Harry Harlow
#18. My plan of instruction is extremely simple and limited. They learn, on week-days, such coarse works as may fit them for servants. I allow of no writing for the poor. My object is not to make fanatics, but to train up the lower classes in habits of industry and piety.
Hannah More
#19. If you don't have time to read, then you have more time to write. Simple as that.
Stephen King
#20. I am writing something very simple that will change you and change the world.
Debasish Mridha
#21. One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.
Jack Kerouac
#22. When men ask me how I know so much about men, they get a simple answer: everything I know about men, I learned from me.
Anton Chekhov
#23. The task of the artist at any time is uncompromisingly simple - to discover what has not yet been done, and to do it.
Craig Raine
#24. Writing barely differs from Talking and Reading. It appoints your hand while they engage your mouth and eyes respectively. The trio need the mind to combine sensible words from a meaningful arrangement of the 'simple' A B C to Z.
Olaotan Fawehinmi
#25. Writing is simple. First you have to make sure you have plenty of paper ... sharp pencils ... typewriter ribbon. Then put your belly up to the desk ... roll a sheet of paper into the typewriter ... and stare at it until beads of blood appear on your forehead.
Jeff MacNelly
#26. If there is any difficulty in what I write, it is because of the material I use. The thought is always simple.
James Joyce
#27. Something good happened to my writing when I stopped being afraid to do something simple, for the fear that people might think I couldn't do something more complex. Don't be confused by the word simple. Simple is not easy, it is clear voiced, and fearlessly elegant.
Carrie Newcomer
#28. When people come to Twitter and they want to express something in the world, the technology fades away. It's them writing a simple message and them knowing that people are going to see it.
Jack Dorsey
#29. I write from my knowledge not my lack, from my strength not my weakness. I am not interested if anyone knows whether or not I am familiar with big words, I am interested in trying to render big ideas in a simple way. I am interested in being understood not admired.
Lucille Clifton
#30. The basic rule [of writing] given us was simple and heartbreaking. A story to be effective had to convey something from the writer to the reader, and the power of its offering was the measure of its excellence. Outside of that, there were no rules.
John Steinbeck
#31. A simple word or phrase on a blank sheet of paper gathers momentum as I wonder at what it could mean, where it could take place, why, and what if? . . . And then, I write.
Tyrean Martinson
#32. Great writing is great writing. It's as simple as all that.
Kate Mulgrew
#33. I attribute my good fortune to the simple fact that I have always tried to write straight from my own heart to the hearts of others.
Marie Corelli
#34. We expect the states to show us whether or not we're achieving simple objectives-like literacy, literacy in math, the ability to read and write.
George W. Bush
#35. If you want to say something profound, writing from your heartbeat is different than writing from the loud voices you get from music. If they're rapping from noise, it's about robbing people. It's that simple.
Russell Simmons
#36. Writing has never been that simple for me.
Pat Conroy
#37. I think that writing should be honest and simple, and it should say something about what it means to be a person. When God is good to us, we write in such a way that the act of reading becomes a pleasure to those who buy our books.
M.V. Carey
#38. My secret is simple. I have a very short attention span, and writing lots of things fast appeases that very attention span.
Shiloh Walker
#39. I do not distinguish between the construction of a book and that of a
painting and I always proceed from the simple to the complex. - 1946
Henri Matisse
#40. How simple the writing of literature would be if it were only necessary to write in another way what has been well written. It is because we have had such great writers in the past that a writer is driven far out past where he can go, out to where no one can help him.
Ernest Hemingway,
#41. In fiction there can be no appeal to any authority outside the book itself ... the thing has to look true, and that is all. It is not made to look true by simple statement.
Percy Lubbock
#42. Myself, I'm just a simple country boy who spent time on the streets and developed a style of writing and rapping and a cool sound that people seem to enjoy.
Big Smo
#43. I think you must remember that a writer is a simple-minded person to begin with and go on that basis. He's not a great mind, he's not a great thinker, he's not a great philosopher, he's a story-teller.
Erskine Caldwell
#44. Just because science can't in practice explain things like the love that motivates a poet to write a sonnet, that doesn't mean that religion can. It's a simple and logical fallacy to say, 'If science can't do something therefore religion can.'
Richard Dawkins
#45. For the writer under Actually Existing Socialism describing sex is a simple matter: he simply does not do it (the describing, I mean, not the sex).
Philip Sington
#46. I didn't even write the lyrics down. I got in the booth, I put down a little guitar riff and the idea I had was it was going to be really simple, I just want it to be all about the lyrics and I just literally sang the lyrics.
Benji Madden
#47. I do not over-intellectualize the production process. I try to keep it simple: Tell the damned story.
Tom Clancy
#48. Birdy never felt artistic inclination when armed with a marking implement. What came to her were words, always words, commentary and criticism and correction and simple vocabulary curios; she scratched a few of them on the smooth red wall.
Antonya Nelson
#49. Writers write. That's all it is. It is as simple, and as complex, as that.
Stephen King
#50. I honestly just love being in my studio working on music. That's all the inspiration I need. And I don't write with an end result in mind, I just write for the simple love of writing.
Moby
#51. It's as simple as finding something on the street and then writing a jingle. If I'm driving and I have my turn signal on and it's rhythmic, maybe I just write a song to that.
Nate Ruess
#52. All we are doing are self-portraits. As simple that. We accumulate knowledge and wisdom and power, and we get our hearts broken, and we write. We write for others to absorb what took us so long to understand.
Cristian Mihai
#53. True perfection in all things is no longer known or prized - you must write music that is either so simple a coachman could sing it, or so unintelligble that audiences like it simply because no sane person could understand it.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
#54. 'Rolling Stone' had started something called 'Outside,' and since I was one of two people in the office that liked going outside, I was pegged to work on it. The concept of the magazine was simple: literate writing about the out-of-doors. I jumped at the opportunity.
Tim Cahill
#55. Writing a great song is not a simple task, but I feel like when everything comes together and you sing it in a certain way that no-one else can sing it, when it's written in a certain way that's perfect for the way that you're performing it, that those are the things that make a song great.
William Beckett
#56. The only way to write complex software that won't fall on its face is to hold its global complexity down - to build it out of simple pieces connected by well-defined interfaces, so that most problems are local and you can have some hope of fixing or optimizing a part without breaking the whole
Eric S. Raymond
#57. To me, obstacles in life build character. You have to be able to overcome adversity in order to succeed and appreciate the simple things life has to offer ... that's where most of my inspiration for writing and singing comes from.
Elliott Yamin
#58. A writer's style should be direct and personal, his imagery rich and earthy, and his words simple and vigorous. The greatest writers have the gift of brilliant brevity, are hard workers, diligent scholars and competent stylists.
Ernest Hemingway,
#59. The challenge of a journalist is to condense a thousand thoughts into a single sound bite. The challenge of an author is to place a simple idea on a canvas as infinite as your imagination. No doubt about it. I have the easier job.
Charles A. Cornell
#60. Desire never stops. Equilibrium is temporary. The self-revelation is never simple, and it cannot guarantee the hero a satisfying life from that day forward. since a great story is always a living thing, its ending is no more final and certain than any other part of the story.
John Truby
#61. The melodies were melodies that anybody could sing or hum or whistle. And the words were just about that simple. I think the stories Hank told in his song fit so many people. Nearly everybody in the audience acted as if Hank were singin to them alone.
Don Helms
#62. Keep it simple. Trust your imagination. Discover what is unique about your imagination. Don't simply read a story and copy it.
I go into myself. Then I transcribe what visions I have. If those ideas are original, and you are devoted, you will go far.
Clive Barker
#63. A lot of the songs on '2' are pretty personal, but even if I'm writing about something like that, I still tend to keep it pretty simple and open-ended. I like the idea of people listening to my album and it meaning something to me but maybe meaning something else to them.
Mac DeMarco
#64. It was one of the dullest speeches I ever heard. The Agee woman told us for three quarters of an hour how she came to write her beastly book, when a simple apology was all that was required.
P.G. Wodehouse
#65. Jane Addams, writing about her Twenty Years at Hull House, said, People did not want to hear about simple things. They wanted to hear about great things - simply told.
Fred Rogers
#66. In the end our lives are nothing more than simple stories. It's good to occasionally step back and make sure you are the one writing.
Jacob Mandel
#67. I have even taught classes on writing about sex, and I've looked closely at different writers' sex scenes. On the level of craft I've given it a lot of thought. The pitfalls are simple: It can sound clinical or medical, which isn't right, or pornographic, because the characters disappear.
K.M. Soehnlein
#68. Then anyone who leaves behind him a written manual, and likewise anyone who receives it, in the belief that such writing will be clear and certain, must be exceedingly simple-minded ...
Plato
#69. 'I need milk' and 'I need to decide whether to buy this company' both tie up space in psychic RAM. The solution is simple. Write it down. Look at it. Do it or say to yourself 'not now'.
David Allen
#70. It's quite simple. I just don't feel right without a pen in my hand denting a hole through my notepad.
Veronika Carnaby
#71. Being a journalist influenced me as a novelist. I mean, a lot of critics think I'm stupid because my sentences are so simple and my method is so direct: they think these are defects. No. The point is to write as much as you know as quickly as possible.
Kurt Vonnegut
#73. A simple style is like white light. Although complex, it does not appear to be so.
Anatole France
#74. At least in my case, a very simple, regular, happy life makes for better writing.
Lauren Groff
#75. You have to remember that I was a bright but simple fellow from Canada who seldom, if ever, met another writer, and then only a so-called literary type that occasionally sold a story and meanwhile worked in an office for a living.
A.E. Van Vogt
#76. It's very simple. If you learn how to write well, to write with depth, cream will rise to the top. You'll get published. But, there is no secret.
Dennis Lehane
#77. The key to good description begins with clear seeing and ends with clear writing, the kind of writing that employs fresh images and simple vocabulary.
Stephen King
#78. Here is a simple recipe to begin with. Get up every morning with the set intention of writing and go to your desk and sit there for three hours, whether you accomplish anything or not. Before long you will find that you are writing madly, not waiting for inspiration.
Gertrude Atherton
#79. People keep asking me ... How to instantly become a better writer? It's simple: Use "power words" and see for yourself.
Ziad K. Abdelnour
#80. Simple English is no one's mother tongue. It has to be worked for.
Jacques Barzun
#81. As simple an act as reading or writing a sentence must be surrounded by perceptory nap and weave ... an itch, a stray memory from childhood, the distant sound of a barking dog, or something left over from the lunch that is found caught between the teeth.
David Brin
#82. Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh is one of the most beloved Buddhist teachers in the West, a rare combination of mystic, poet, scholar, and activist. His luminous presence and the simple, compassionate clarity of his writings have touched countless lives.
Joanna Macy
#83. Life would be so simple if we could re-write the bad parts but since we can't, let's make the good parts worth writing about
Sharlay
#84. Short, sweet, and to the point. Clear writing, and therefore clear commands, comes from clear thinking. Think simple.
Tim Ferriss
#85. I knew a lot of chords, but they weren't the chords that came with the melody that came with the idea I had for the song. Melodies are simple things. If you see a train wreck, there's a melody. If you see a little daisy blowing in the breeze, there's a melody.
Tom T. Hall
#86. Art, in a sense, is life brought to a standstill, rescued from time. The secret of making it is simple: discard everything that is good enough.
James Salter
#87. My working habits are simple: long periods of thinking, short periods of writing.
Ernest Hemingway,
#88. [G]reat stories communicate simple truths that reflect the poetic dimensions of the human soul. Not only do powerful characters help us understand our lives, their stories reflect our core values as human beings.
Kate Wright
#89. If we are exhorted to play simple melodies with beauty rather than difficult ones with error, the same should be applied to writing; simple words greater effect.
Sonia Rumzi
#90. "War gives men a plain-and-simple something to do ... Women write diaries in the hope that their words will beckon fate." It's a romantic manifesto.
James Ellroy
#91. The music I was writing for 'Hamlet' needed to be very simple because there was so much going on with the dialogue in that play, so I felt like the music had to complement that - so that carried on through; I was working on the soundtrack and the album simultaneously.
Sarah Blasko
#92. You can't be a writer if you don't write, it's just that simple.
Nicholas Sparks
#93. A child can identify with adult characters- but only if they are sympathetically drawn and simple enough.
Edmund Wallace Hildick
#94. He asked, "What makes a man a writer?" "Well," I said, "it's simple. You either get it down on paper, or jump off a bridge.
Charles Bukowski
#95. I read all the time so it's difficult to say who my all-time favourites are. One is George Orwell, because he makes political writing so simple a child could understand it.
Melvin Burgess
#96. If you want to write, write. It's as simple as that.
K.D. Green
#97. Prof. Emi Ito said "Lailah, if you can't explain the scientific observations in a simple sentence, it means you do not know enough.
Lailah Gifty Akita
#98. The germ of a story is a new and simple element introduced into an existing situation or mood.
Malcolm Cowley
#99. I began to write and came to see that writing has the same laws as nature. The simplest way to say something is always the best. Is that simple enough?
Chloe Thurlow
#100. The way to write American music is simple. All you have to do is be an American and then write any kind of music you wish.
Virgil Thomson
Famous Authors
Popular Topics
Scroll to Top
