Writers are frequently asked why they wrote their first…

I was about 13, in some ways, when I wrote the first book. Approximately 18 when I wrote the second.

— Jonathan Franzen

My sole inspiration is a telephone call from a director. ... (when asked who wrote 'Some Enchanted Evening') Rodgers and Hammerstein, if you can…

— Cole Porter

“Gertrude Stein, when asked why she wrote, replied "For praise." Lorca said he wrote to be loved. Faulkner said a writer wrote for glory.…

— James Salter

When I wrote 'Savage Season,' it was three years later before I wrote the second Hap and Leonard novel. Whenever I wrote one, I…

— Joe R. Lansdale

As soon as I finished the first book, I wrote a second, which I hope to sell this year, and I have just about…

— Richard Helms

I wrote 'On Second Thought' in five minutes in the back of my bus going through Montana.

— Eddie Rabbitt

My boyfriend suggested I write two pages a day. He wouldn't take me out if I hadn't done my two pages. That's how I…

— S. E. Hinton

“To be honest, however, I will have to admit that I wrote this book for the original model - the one who was overkidsed,…

— Erma Bombeck

The ones that were relevant while I wrote my book were books like "Beloved" by Toni Morrison, which is based on a historical fact,…

— Laila Lalami

I think of my success as a kind of fluke. How else could I possibly think of it? And although it's a banal thing…

— Ayana Mathis

I guess if I wrote a book one day, it would be about hair

— Julia Louis-Dreyfus

When I wrote my first book, I was too scared to find out how people got books published. I was convinced that you needed…

— Taylor Jenkins Reid

“I just wrote a book. But don't go and buy it yet, because I don't think it's finished.”

— Lawrence Welk

“I stopped writing the book that I wanted to write, and wrote the one the book wanted to write.”

— Jim Lewis

“I wrote this book because I had formed a strong impression that the people currently living were paying insufficient attention to the dead.”

— Niall Ferguson