Writer Quotes · Page 237

I believe that, in any novel of mine, the principal objective is the construction of the whole.

— John Irving

Writing is the destruction of every voice, of every point of origin.

— Roland Barthes

I'm not disciplined enough to be a writer consistently. I write when I have to.

— Vin Diesel

I try and write the way things happen. I don't try and fulfill people's wishes

— Harvey Pekar

In some areas I am more noted for reading then I am for cookies!

— Wally Amos

“I never thought I wanted to write. Never did I know I can either, until now.”

— C.A. Dimayuga

“Alma came to consider her library work as a kind of indoor gardening,”

— Elizabeth Gilbert

“In the shop we buy and sell them, but in truth books have no owner.”

— Carlos Ruiz Zafón

“Reading is an intimate act, perhaps more intimate than any other human act. I say that because of the prolonged (or intense)…

— Harold Brodkey

Our human impulse is to control everything, but fiction seems to me to be about allowing an element of mystery into the…

— Lauren Groff

...our enjoyment of the great works of literature depends more upon the depth of our sympathy than upon our understanding.

— Helen Keller

Granddad was superstitious about books. He thought that if you had enough of them around, education leaked out, like radioactivity.

— Terry Pratchett

Obsession led me to write. It's been that way with every book I've ever written. I become completely consumed by a theme,…

— Anne Rice

I write all the time. I do artwork that's part of a diary, and I write short stories to go with them…

— Mark Mothersbaugh

What I like in novels that I read and enjoy is interplay of theme: the mystery of how we seem to be…

— Sebastian Faulks

Substitute "damn" every time you're inclined to write "very"; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it…

— Mark Twain

“Oh but to write what you think is so amazing- whoosh, whoosh, you don't even know how you're doing it and suddenly…

— Nescio

I'm not good at narrative; I'm really a gag writer, and that comes from being in the newspaper comic strip world for…

— Jeff Kinney

“I am more optimistic, both about reading and about books. There will always be non-readers, bad readers, lazy readers – there always…

— Julian Barnes

I think everyone's a little afraid of being part of a trend, because you get compared to each other. Writers tend to…

— Veronica Roth

Whatever I was writing at the time, I knew there was no market for it and never would be, because there’s never…

— Nell Zink

When you are what we call a 'minority writer,' a writer of color, a writer of any kind of difference, there is…

— Rumaan Alam

A writer can't just be well-educated or good at research; to build a living, breathing world with interesting characters, you have to…

— Lynn Flewelling

If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second-greatest favor you can do them is to present them…

— Dorothy Parker

“Writing is a passion. Nurture it. Fame is incidental.”

— Mehreen Ahmed

I think once I began to trust myself as a writer, I began to be seen as a writer.

— Natasha Rothwell

“If being a writer doesn't make you humble, nothing else will." ~ Verge Le Noir”

— Verge LeNoir

“A remarkable number of the memoirs of booksellers are basically anecdote delivery devices.”

— Travis McDade

I am neither an Occidental writer nor a Russian writer. I am an accidental writer.

— Joseph Brodsky

All fiction is largely autobiographical and much autobiography is, of course, fiction.

— Anonymous

If you can write any way and it's working out, just bow down in gratitude.

— Jennifer Egan

Setting is my primary joy as a writer, building a world and watching people respond to it.

— Nicola Griffith

There's way too much pain in this business for anyone who doesn't HAVE to write.

— R. A. Salvatore

Every writer has to find their own way into writing.

— Margaret Mahy

I kind of live like a writer. I get up and I write. I've done that my whole life.

— Noah Baumbach

Any book has behind it all the other books that have been written.

— Anthony Burgess

You know what they say: When people start burning books they'll soon burn human beings.

— Cornelia Funke

Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them all

— Henry David Thoreau

There's a truth that comes through when an author performs his own work that is unique and special.

— Michael Feinstein

From my most unnoticed actions, my most veiled writing - from these alone will I be understood.

— C.P. Cavafy