Writer Quotes · Page 177

A book's flaws make it less predictable.

— Janet Fitch

I'm wondering what to read next.

— Roald Dahl

“I turned to books for comfort.”

— Laura Bush

I'm a total slave to a good story.

— Paul Sparks

“Reading is reading - no matter what the material.”

— Giovanna Fletcher

Anything that gets children reading is fine.

— Michael Morpurgo

I write to find out what I didn't know I knew.

— Robert Frost

“Rewriting is the essence of writing well:”

— William Zinsser

A novel must give a sense of permanence as well as a sense of life.

— Anonymous

A book may be very amusing with numerous errors, or it may be very dull without a single absurdity.

— Anonymous

The child who is being raised strictly by the book is probably a first edition.

— Vikrant Parsai

Books are only the shadow and life the real thing. I believe this as strongly as any belief I hold.

— Esther Forbes

When I'm inspired, I jot things down and put them in a pile.

— Yoko Ono

Great writing fills me with hopeful enthusiasm and never envy.

— Hisham Matar

“How do I know a really good book? When, between the pages, I come undone.”

— Marcia Whyte

I read 'The Original Beauty Bible' when I was 16, and it changed my life.

— Andreja Pejic

It's just as well that I write in the same facile way wherever I am - no blocks or anguish, no contemplation,…

— Peter York

It is quite too common a practice, both in readers and the more superficial class of critics, to judge a book by…

— James Russell Lowell

I focus on the writing and let the rest of the process take care of itself. I've learned to trust my own…

— Sue Grafton

“I am so obsessed with my life that the books I used to read are resting in the bookshelf for years and…

— Neymat Khan

At the time I was taught to read, it was an Eden-like time of my life. My mother adored me. Everyone adored…

— Jamaica Kincaid

These are rules I've picked up along the way to help me remain invisible when I'm writing a book, to help me…

— Elmore Leonard

Books to the ceiling, Books to the sky, My pile of books is a mile high. How I love them! How I…

— Arnold Lobel

Classics are books which, the more we think we know them through hearsay, the more original, unexpected, and innovative we find them…

— Italo Calvino

Could there be a more hilarious sad sack than Duncan Leland, whose trials and tribulations, so wittily conveyed, had me laughing (and…

— Mameve Medwed

I try to write in the morning when I'm working on a novel. You get up, you have breakfast, you read the…

— Carolyn See

Two kinds of reading can be distinguished. I call them reading like a reader and reading like a writer ... when you…

— Frank Smith

What occurs to people when they read Kurt [Vonnegut] is that things are much more up for grabs than they thought they…

— Mark Vonnegut

My novels are never truly finished, even if they're published and sitting on the shelf. While I may no longer be interested…

— Jillian Medoff

“Writers jealous of their individual style are obliged to wring the utmost effect from a tiny range of marks – which explains…

— Lynne Truss

“As you never tire of stating, the only moral imperative for the writer, against which there is no recourse, is to return…

— Juan Goytisolo

The aim of great books is ethical: to teach what it means to be a man. Every major form of literary art…

— Russell Kirk

People read every thing nowadays, except books.

— Sophie Swetchine

“To write a novel, you need an iron butt.”

— Richard M. Nixon

“A book reread is a new story.”

— Moonstarsenergy

You become writer by writing. It is a yoga.

— R.K. Narayan

“It is difficult to write about a real person.”

— T.H. White

From candlelight to early bedtime, I read.

— Thomas Jefferson

We need the books that affect us like a disaster

— Franz Kafka

Writers are people who put pen to paper every day.

— Richard Russo