Authorship Quotes · Page 2

“When I write, my soul sings.”

— Melissa Marsh

Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well.

— John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby

“Try to be someone upon whom nothing is lost!”

— Henry James

And hold up to the sun my little taper.

— Lord Byron

Subtract from many modern poets all that may be found in Shakespeare, and trash will remain.

— Charles Caleb Colton

To write well is to think well, to feel well, and to render well; it is to possess at once intellect, soul,…

— Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon

Peaceable times are the best to live in, though not so proper to furnish materials for a writer.

— Joseph Addison

A man of moderate Understanding, thinks he writes divinely: A man of good Understanding, thinks he writes reasonably.

— Jean de la Bruyere

To expect an author to talk as he writes is ridiculous; or even if he did you would find fault with him…

— William Hazlitt

Authors must not, like Chinese soldiers, expect to win victories by turning somersets in the air.

— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“The calling of an author is more than just to entertain, but also to share ones experiences with the world.”

— M.J. Stoddard

I think, for me, when I direct my own work it's just an extension of the authorship.

— Adam Rapp

“Why I love these words They are mine You cannot change that You cannot rearrange that Try as you might You cannot…

— Maddy Kobar

Evolution advances, not by a priori design, but by the selection of what works best out of whatever choices offer. We are…

— George Wald

A man of letters is often a man with two natures,--one a book nature, the other a human nature. These often clash…

— Edwin Percy Whipple

The little mind who loves itself, will wr'te and think with the vulgar; but the great mind will be bravely eccentric, and…

— Oliver Goldsmith

I proceed with the proper subject of this discourse; namely, the further changes in scientific belief, which have occurred within my own…

— Asa Gray

The writer, like a priest, must be exempted from secular labor. His work needs a frolic health; he must be at the…

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ye who write, choose a subject suited to your abilities. [Lat., Sumite materiam vestris, qui scribitis, aequam Viribus.]

— Horace

As in digging for precious metals in the mines, much earthy rubbish has first to be troublesomely handled and thrown out; so,…

— Herman Melville

Nothing so fretful, so despicable as a Scribbler, see what I am, and what a parcel of Scoundrels I have brought about…

— Lord Byron

Insofar as I think about postmodernism at all, and it doesn't exactly keep me awake at nights, I think of it as…

— Jonathan Raban

Those authors into whose hands nature has placed a magic wand, with which they no sooner touch us than we forget the…

— Denis Diderot

I think Republicans now are recognizing that [Obamacare cancellation] may not be what the American people, including even [Donald] Trump voters, are…

— Barack Obama

My music, it breathes. It's the mysticism of sound. I'm a sound seeker, and I'm enthralled with it, by what it can…

— Charles Lloyd

“Poetic justice, with her lifted scale, Where, in nice balance, truth with gold she weighs, And solid pudding against empty praise. Here…

— Alexander Pope

I don't particularly care about photographic authorship. Whether an astronaut who doesn't even have a viewfinder makes an image, a robotic camera,…

— Michael Light

The notorious tendency of conservative apologists and New Age paperback writers alike is to leap from mere possibility to the right to…

— Robert M. Price

“I ran across an excerpt today (in English translation) of some dialogue/narration from the modern popular writer, Paulo Coelho in his book:…

— Roman Payne

“It may take a decade or two before the extent of Shakespeare's collaboration passes from the graduate seminar to the undergraduate lecture,…

— James Shapiro

“He showed, in a few words, that it is not sufficient to throw together a few incidents that are to be met…

— Voltaire

“One picks one's way about through the glass and aluminum doors, the receptionists' smiles, the lunches with too much alcohol, the openings…

— Samuel R. Delany

The familiar writer is apt to be his own satirist. Out of his own mouth is he judged.

— Edwin Percy Whipple

He who writes prose builds his temple to Fame in rubble; he who writes verses builds it in granite.

— Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

“Writing - the act of one person giving a piece of their soul to another.”

— Anonymous

People may be taken in once, who imagine that an author is greater in private life than other men.

— Samuel Johnson

if have got my spindle and my distaff ready--my pen and mind--never doubting for an instant that God will send me flax.

— J. G. Holland

Envy's a sharper spur than pay: No author ever spar'd a brother; Wits are gamecocks to one another.

— John Gay

“When writing feels like jumping a cliff, grab the nearest pen!”

— Susan J. McIntire

“To lead and live the life of your dream, you must arise and be in-charge of the authorship of your own destiny.”

— Ifeanyi Enoch Onuoha