“Not everyone is capable of writing junk fiction: It requires an authentic junk mind.” — John Gardner Copy Share Image
Nothing can be more limiting to the imagination than only writing about what you know — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“[the writer] must copy, with his finite mind, the process of the infinite 'I AM.” — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Good writers may “tell” about almost anything in fiction except the characters’ feelings.” — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The people I've known who wanted to become writers, knowing what it meant, did become writers.” — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“A story is like a machine with numerous gears: it should contain no gear that doesn't turn something” — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“one sign of a writer’s potential is his especially sharp ear—and eye—for language.” — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The writer sensitive to language finds his own metaphors, not simply because he has been taught to avoid clichés but because he… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“It is for this reason that Aristotle recommends that the writer begin "in the middle of things" and fill in the exposition… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“...{N}othing is harder for the developing writer than overcoming his anxiety that he is fooling himself and cheating or embarrassing his family… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“As a general rule, highly rational writers (like Nabokov) write most comfortably in the morning, and mainly intuitive writers write most comfortably… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
Art Gropes. It stalks like a hunter lost in the woods, listening to itself and to everything around it, unsure of itself,… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
Fiction does not spring into the world fully grown, like Athena. It is the process of writing and rewriting that makes a… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“He must shape simultaneously (in an expanding creative moment) his characters, plot, and setting, each inextricably connected to the others; he must… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
Writing a novel is like heading out over the open sea in a small boat. It helps, if you have a plan… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“As in the universe every atom has an effect, however miniscule, on every other atom, so that to pinch the fabric of… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The question one asks of the young writer who wants to know if he's got what it takes is this: "Is writing… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“One has to be just a little crazy to write a great novel. One must be capable of allowing the darkest, most… — john gardner Copy Share Image
“Because his art is such a difficult one, the writer is not likely to advance in the world as visibly as do… — john gardner Copy Share Image
A common and usually unfortunate answer is “Write about what you know.” Nothing can be more limiting to the imagination, nothing is… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“One cannot judge in advance whether or not the idea of the story is worthwhile because until one has finished writing the… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Theoretically there's no reason one should get [writer's block], if one understands that writing, after all, is only writing, neither something one… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“all writers, given adequate technique—technique that communicates—can stir our interest in their special subject matter, since at heart all fiction treats, directly… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Nothing is sillier than the creative writing teacher's dictum "Write about what you know." But whether you're writing about people or dragons,… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Fiction, like sculpture or painting, begins with a rough sketch. One gets down the characters and their behavior any way one can,… — john gardner Copy Share Image
“Daemonic compulsiveness can kill as easily as it can save. The true novelist must be at once driven and indifferent. Van Gogh… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“In writing short stories—as in writing novels—take one thing at a time. (For some writers, this advice I'm giving may apply best… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“There seems little or no hope for the adult writer who produces sentences like these: "Her cheeks were thick and smooth and… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Good writers may “tell” about almost anything in fiction except the characters’ feelings. One may tell the reader that the character went… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The writer's characters must stand before us with a wonderful clarity, such continuous clarity that nothing they do strikes us as improbable… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The instruction here is not for every kind of writer - not for the writer of nurse books or thrillers or porno… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The age old idea of human dignity comes to apply even to the indigent, even to the slaves, even to immigrants, now… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“It is the importance of this quality of generosity in fiction that requires a measure of childishness in the writer. People who… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“A scene will not be vivid if the writer gives too few details to stir and guide the reader's imagination; neither will… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“The shoddy writer wants only publication. He fails to recognize that almost anyone willing to devote between twelve and fourteen hours a… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“A good writer is likely to know and use, or find out and use, the words for common architectural features, like "lintel,"… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“I think there really is no other way to write a long, serious novel. You work, shelve it for a while, work,… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Like other kinds of intelligence, the storyteller's is partly natural, partly trained. It is composed of several qualities, most of which, in… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“Theme is not imposed on the story but evoke from within it--initally an intuitive but finally an intellectual act on the part… — John Gardner Copy Share Image
“All to often, on the long road up, young leaders become servants of what is rather than shapers of what might be.” — John Gardner Copy Share
When I was a child I truly loved: Unthinking love as calm and deep As the North Sea. But I have lived, And now… — John Gardner Copy Share
“They only think they think. No total vision, total system, merely schemes with a vague family resemblance, no more identity than bridges and, say,… — John Gardner Copy Share
“Except in stock locutions, such as "You were paid yesterday," "The Germans were defeated," or "The project was abandoned," the passive voice is virtually… — John Gardner Copy Share
“The instruction here is not for every kind of writer - not for the writer of nurse books or thrillers or porno or the… — John Gardner Copy Share
“Good writers may “tell” about almost anything in fiction except the characters’ feelings. One may tell the reader that the character went to a… — John Gardner Copy Share
“the chief offense in bad fiction: we sense that characters are being manipulated, forced to do things they would not really do.” — John Gardner Copy Share
“There seems little or no hope for the adult writer who produces sentences like these: "Her cheeks were thick and smooth and held a… — John Gardner Copy Share
“In any long fiction, Henry James remarked, use of the first-person point of view is barbaric. James may go too far, but his point… — John Gardner Copy Share
Nothing can be more limiting to the imagination than only writing about what you know — John Gardner Copy Share
A nation that values bad philosophy above good plumbing will have neither good philosophy nor good plumbing — John Gardner Copy Share
The citizen can bring our political and governmental institutions back to life, make them responsive and accountable, and keep them honest. No one else… — John Gardner Copy Share
Talking, talking. Spinning a web of words, pale walls of dreams, between myself and all I see. — John Gardner Copy Share
“In writing short stories—as in writing novels—take one thing at a time. (For some writers, this advice I'm giving may apply best to a… — John Gardner Copy Share
All order, I've come to understand, is theoretical, unreal, a harmless, sensible, smiling mask men slide between the two great, dark realities, the self… — John Gardner Copy Share
![“[the writer] must copy, with his finite mind, the process of the infinite 'I AM.” quote by John Gardner](https://sms4smile.com/q/img-quotes/10b/john-gardner-3092_character-developmen_the-writer-must-copy-with-his-finite-min_889329.png)
![“Theoretically there's no reason one should get [writer's block], if one understands that writing, after all, is only writing, neither something one ought to feel deeply guilty about nor something one ought to be inordinately proud of.” quote by John Gardner](https://sms4smile.com/q/img-quotes/8f0/john-gardner-3092_advice_theoretically-there-s-no-reason-one-shou_1625413.png)
