Top 100 Quotes About Writing And Inspiration
#2. I wrote a book. It sucked. I wrote nine more books. They sucked, too. Meanwhile, I read every single thing I could find on publishing and writing, went to conferences, joined professional organizations, hooked up with fellow writers in critique groups, and didn't give up. Then I wrote one more book.
Beth Revis
#3. Books are a gateway to the extraordinary, a portal for the unfettered imagination and limitless creativity.
Diana Jane Heath
#4. There are times when I can't believe how much ridiculous stuff happens to me and how brilliant it is to be in a position to write about it.
Carla H. Krueger
#5. Writing is more than just a method to tell stories. It's a way to find healing, and to healing others.
M. Kirin
#6. Don't waste time waiting for inspiration. Begin, and inspiration will find you.
H. Jackson Brown Jr.
#7. I grew up with my older brother listening to hip hop, and Jay-Z was the main person I listened to. When it comes to his word play, he's just out of this world. That's my biggest inspiration when it comes to writing lyrics.
Tinchy Stryder
#8. I can't explain inspiration. A writer is either compelled to write or not. And if I waited for inspiration I wouldn't really be a writer.
Toni Morrison
#10. Let your story grow. Let it surprise you, and it will certainly surprise your readers.
M. Kirin
#11. Grub Street turns out good things almost as often as Parnassus. For if a writer is hard up enough, if he's far down enough (down where I have been and am rising from, I am really saying), he can't afford self-doubt and he can't let other people's opinions, even a father's, keep him from writing.
Wallace Stegner
#12. I write when I feel like it, and I feel like it most of the time.
Jerzy Kosinski
#13. First forget inspiration. Habit is more dependable. Habit will sustain you whether you're inspired or not. Habit will help you finish and polish your stories. Inspiration won't. Habit is persistence in practice.
Octavia E. Butler
#14. I'm trying to write for people my age. And my inspiration over the years has changed dramatically.
John Mellencamp
#15. Writers get ideas all day every day. The FedEx guy delivers a package from Sears and the writer is thinking how it could actually be a ticking time bomb.
Dan Alatorre
#16. If you like fantasy and you want to be the next Tolkien, don't read big Tolkienesque fantasies - Tolkien didn't read big Tolkienesque fantasies, he read books on Finnish philology. Go and read outside of your comfort zone, go and learn stuff.
Neil Gaiman
#17. To write fiction, one needs a whole series of inspirations about people in an actual environment, and then a whole lot of work on the basis of those inspirations.
Aldous Huxley
#18. I think inspiration is strongest when I find a balance between observation and participation. You can't write about what it means to dance by watching from the bleachers.
Chelsey Philpot
#19. Yesterday is gone, and tomorrow is beyond our reach. The best time to write is now, in the present.
M. Kirin
#20. Though he had spoken of the subject many times, in the silence of his room he added the powerful kind of phrasing that would not have occurred to him as he spoke, because it's origins were in the collaboration of hand and pen.
Mark Helprin
#21. Stop beating yourself up over all the days you didn't work on your story. Focus on what you can do today.
Sit down, and write.
M. Kirin
#22. One night, Don Henley called, and I told him, 'I'm washing dishes and bike shorts.' He said, 'It's in the domestic exercises of life that one will find the biggest inspiration.' And he was right.
Sheryl Crow
#23. I would be perfectly willing if a publisher came up to me and said, "I need a novel about underwater Nazi cheerleaders and it has to be 309 pages long and I need fourteen chapters and a prologue.
Michael McDowell
#24. I take my inspiration for the song writing from little experiences, not even if I've experienced them myself but say if something has made me sad, I will use that emotion. I just use everyday life and write about it.
Pixie Lott
#25. When his writing is going well, Gordon Strangle Mars likes to wake up at 6 a.m. and go out driving. He works out new plot lines about giant spiders and keeps an eye out for abandoned couches, which he wrestles into the back of his pickup truck. Then he writes for the rest of the day.
Kelly Link
#26. That kiss was amazing; it had all the passion and longing we had been holding onto for so long. That is when the dam finally broke for me and I started crying. I knew right then that Hunter was the only one I wanted. He was my happily ever after.
Megan Smith
#27. The sign of the amateur is overglorification of and preoccupation with the mystery. The professional shuts up. She doesn't talk about it. She does her work.
Steven Pressfield
#28. People think I live here on Nantucket and just gaze at the ocean, getting my inspiration. Not so. I work in my basement and gaze out onto a single window that shows me a cement wall. This is a profession, and it's important to have professionalism about the writing.
Nathaniel Philbrick
#29. The greatest moments of creativity come in absolute solitude, when one's mind is free from distraction and able to probe the depths of the impossible.
Fennel Hudson
#30. The essential key for writing is to write regularly - like it or not - great ideas come often by writing; releasing the subconscious - waiting for inspiration and ideas will not work, but it does help to have a notebook with you all the time for sudden brainstorms or inspiration.
Robert Marc Friedman
#31. Mistress Creation keeps calling my name ... i long for her, and she, for me ... we will be reunited soon. In the interim, i bide my time dreaming of her, writing about her and stretching her across the vast landscape of my imagination. "Soon", i whisper to her, "Soon
Jaeda DeWalt
#32. Our business is communication oftentimes through the medium of stories but our capacity has a far greater scope - to entertain certainly, but also to stimulate debate, to mark up changes and differences and that way, to maybe, just now and then, to change the world.
Sara Sheridan
#33. When I type a title page, I hold it and I look at it and I think, I just need four thousand sentences to go with this and I'll have a book.
Betsy Byars
#34. I spent three days a week for 10 years educating myself in the public library, and it's better than college. People should educate themselves
you can get a complete education for no money. At the end of 10 years, I had read every book in the library and I'd written a thousand stories.
Ray Bradbury
#35. Inspiration for what we produce comes from reading, observing the world of humans around us and also the animal kingdom
Walt Disney Company
#36. Language imparts identity, meaning, and perspective to our human condition. Writers are either polluters or part of the cleanup.
Mary Pipher
#37. Today I fed him right off the bat, and only checked Facebook twice.
Chila Woychik
#38. The difference between fanfic and a "real" novel is that fanfic is honest about its inspiration.
Mary Robinette Kowal
#39. Creativity and intelligence, rather than violence, are the best problem solvers.
Don Roff
#40. I follow where the story goes. Always. Every time. Sometimes it goes places where I'm not comfortable ... it's at those times that I just listen to my characters, hold on with both hands, and trust that my readers won't lynch me later.
Dennis Sharpe
#41. You think you have no 'talent'? Write anyway. lots of people with 'talent' don't actually act on it. As long as you write, you will learn, you will improve, and you will be better than anyone claiming to have 'talent.
M. Kirin
#42. Sacred actions: gratitude, praying, dancing, hugging, singing, writing, painting, drawing, gardening, jogging, reading, knitting and many more!
Lailah Gifty Akita
#43. All that is required of you is an open mind and a little patience.
F.K. Preston
#44. Writing is an adventure. There is no way to know where it will take you, and what you will find. You could find success. You could find fans. Or, best of all, you could find yourself.
M. Kirin
#45. Words are powerful. Words make a difference. They can create and destroy. They can open doors and close doors. Words can create illusion or magic, love or destruction. ... All those things.
R.M. Engelhardt
#46. But perhaps it is always so, that men form their conceptions from fictitious, conventional types, and then - all the combinations made - they are tired of the fictitious figures and begin to invent more natural, true figures.
Leo Tolstoy
#47. I can't really write unless I'm full of inspiration. And even then I can't write unless I have some alone time.
Brett Dennen
#48. I get my best writing done when I'm supposed to be doing something else entirely. And that's why I keep my day job.
Joyce Rachelle
#49. The greatest happiness is a quiet kind. It's the tender understanding that we're living in a very strange place full of strange creatures. And there's quite a bit of wonder in that.
F.K. Preston
#50. The best ending ever, for a science fiction book - or any novel, now that I think about it - was in Rendezvous With Rama. You know that you're at the end of the book and yet, there is no resolution. Then he hits you with those last six words. Better yet, the power is in the very last word. Wow!
John Gaver
#51. 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
#52. I left my novels for better times, when I could dedicate the energy and enjoy the inspiration I feel while planning them; like the most delicious cherries on a cake one left for later so they can be savored to the utmost.
Sahara Sanders
#53. Writing, for me, is very inspiration-dependent. And inspiration can be a jerk.
Gene Luen Yang
#54. I'm sure that writing isn't a craft, that is, something for which you learn the skills and go on turning out. It must come from some deep impulse, deep inspiration. That can't be taught, it can't be what you use in teaching.
Robert Lowell
#55. 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
#56. But if you don't understand that story is character and not just idea, you will not be able to breathe life into even the most intriguing flash of inspiration.
Elizabeth George
#57. A pen is never worthless. In the right hand, it holds a whole world and all the treasures you could ever want. Now write your story. All of it.
Ian Baucom
#58. How....will I ever truly depict you?
You're perfect, my writing isn't.
Sanober Khan
#59. We do not wait for inspiration. We work because we've jolly well got to. But when all is said and done, we toil at this particular job because it's turned out to be our particular job, and in a weird sort of way I suppose we may be said to like it.
Ngaio Marsh
#60. It isn't the subjects we write about but the seriousness and subtlety of our expression that determines the worth of or effort.
Joyce Carol Oates
#61. There's no "magic secret"; writing is like everything else; ten percent inspiration or talent, and ninety percent hard work. Persistence; keeping at it till you get there. As Agnes de Mille said, it means working every day - bored, tired, weary, or with a fever of a hundred and two.
Marion Zimmer Bradley
#62. I tend to avoid writing music about initial reactions to situations, like frustration or anger. I'd rather wait till I go through the problem, and write about the learning that took place.
Yanni
#63. When I told my teachers I wanted to be a writer, alot of them encouraged me to lower my expectations and to be more realistic. So I rode away on my magical, winged horse, spraying faerie dust behind me, and laughing manically as I went.
M.E. Vaughan
#64. I'd write over and over, 'I will not throw into coverage.'
Brett Favre
#65. The process of creation can be unpredictable and, in some way, similar to love: the brightest waves of inspiration may sometimes occur in wrong timing, wrong places, or even with wrong people.
Sahara Sanders
#66. I've probably put my 10,000 hours into writing, but I believe writing well is also greatly influenced by certain intangibles like mood and inspiration.
Bill Loguidice
#67. When I stopped trying to write songs, that's when I'm able to begin writing songs. You have to just use your life, and the things around you for your inspiration.
Lenny Kravitz
#68. Writing is an art, and true art comes from inspiration, which makes me wonder what kind of fucked-up lives some of my favorite authors have led. Surely
Stevie J. Cole
#69. The orator yields to the inspiration of a transient occasion, and speaks to the mob, before him, to those who can hear him; but the writer, whose more equable life is his crowd which inspire the orator, speaks to the intellect and heart of mankind, to all in any age who can understand him.
Henry David Thoreau
#70. I've found that busting your ass on a daily basis to make your art good, clear, and meaningful creates the most luck.
Don Roff
#71. writing is a craft, not an art, and that the man who runs away from his craft because he lacks inspiration is fooling himself.
William Zinsser
#72. It also seems that the unhappy writers are the enduring writer. Hampered or limited by their suffering, literature becomes their focus and salvation, forcing them to give their best every moment of creation. Writing becomes their medicine, their way of escape, the catalyst for their imagination.
Cirilo F. Bautista
#73. You're always going to write and draw inspiration from things that you're feeling, things that you've felt. It's kind of impossible not to unless you're writing a song and there's an exact scenario that you're trying to write a song for.
Harry Styles
#74. 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
#75. The inspiration for my novels comes from the depths of a creative well, based on asking myself questions over and over. I try to write something different each time I sit down to write; I try to surprise the readers.
Nicholas Sparks
#76. If insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results - then success is insanity squared!
(2012 SCBWI New Member Conference; Richmond, VA)
Brian Rock
#77. Writing has been sewn into my soul and I'm afraid my thoughts have no choice but to be the truth to the story and my hand the connection between the pen and paper. With every word written, my heart finds its beat and inspiration fuels the desire to fulfill this need.
Amber M. Royse
#78. There's always a personal satisfaction in writing a song by yourself. You get the inspiration, and see it through, and you're done. It's focused and very personal.
John Oates
#79. Inspiration and stealing are two completely different things. If somebody wants to make a song like "Stairway to Heaven" and writes a song on acoustic guitar, Led Zeppelin does not own every song that's on acoustic guitar for the rest of time.
Robin Thicke
#80. God produced great writing, a matter of first importance to a man like Lincoln, ever impressed with the nature of cause and forces.
Richard Brookhiser
#81. There's two kinds of women
those you write poems about and those you don't.
Jeffrey McDaniel
#82. I notice inspiration when it comes by. I don't sit down at my desk and try to write.
Gary Panter
#83. What is hell to a writer? Hell is being too busy to find the time to write or being unable to find the inspiration. Hell is suddenly finding the words but being away from your notebook or typewriter. Hell is when the verses slip away through your fingers and they never return again.
R.M. Engelhardt
#84. Writing is a struggle against the silence where words can have a powerful impact in just a split second and change your life forever ...
Lisa Jones
#85. I've long considered becoming a writer to be the death of nightmares. For me at least, since I started writing I hadn't had any. Something really terrible or awful happens in a dream and you wake up and think, awesome, and reach for a pen and paper.
Logan Kain
#86. In the earlier days I did most of the song writing by myself, and I got to a place in my life where I felt it was necessary to go outside my box and get some outside inspiration.
Jason Wade
#87. Poets should never stop writing, because their words could be a powerful inspiration to someone else, whether it be now or 100 years from today.
Delano Johnson
#88. Keep being bold on the page, and in life, and people cannot ignore you forever.
Don Roff
#90. I don't like re-writing very much. The fourth and the fifth draft - that's too much like work. There's not much inspiration about it, and the lawyerly side kicks in - being very careful and somewhat technical.
Scott Turow
#91. I keep dying and hoping you notice me. But you're too busy living.
F.K. Preston
#92. Writing is like making a delicious cake. Use the best ingredients, layer the flavors, and finish it with panache. If your product is made with good taste, people will ask for more.
Claudia McCants
#93. The songs that I sing and the songs that I write have always just been what I feel my voice does well, and what my inspirations have been and a kind of culmination of everything.
Josh Groban
#94. We all are rich and ignore the buried fact of accumulated wisdom.
Ray Bradbury
#95. Others may write from the head, but he writes from the heart, and the heart will always understand him.
Washington Irving
#96. Sometimes I get the start of a story from a memory, an anecdote, but that gets lost and is usually unrecognizable in the final story.
[A Conversation with Alice Munro, BookBrowse, 1998]
Alice Munro
#97. Don't forget Who you are writing for. It's easy to get discouraged when people don't like your writing, but that's just it. They're people. You don't want to serve people, you want to serve God. Write for Him, and ignore what other people say. It just doesn't matter.
Ivy Rose
#98. It makes me feel like a brother, or a son that people still care for me ... that I have so many fans, who write to me and share with me that I am loved and have been an inspiration. My Dear Fans This I Promise I Will Never Forget. One Love!
Asafa Powell
#99. ...writing allows us to reposition ourselves so we can see what is otherwise in our mental blind spots or those things about oneself and the world that we neither can see nor understand from the spot where we stand.
Rob Bignell, Editor
#100. It is as well that the world knows only a fine piece of work and not also its origins, the conditions under which it came into being; for knowledge of the sources of an artist's inspiration would often confuse readers and shock them, and the excellence of the writing would be of no avail.
Thomas Mann
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