You can't teach people to write well. Writing well is something God lets you do or declines to let you do. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
There is no shortage of wonderful writers. What we lack is a dependable mass of readers. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
He did not think of himself as a writer for the simple reason that the world had never allowed him to think… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Somebody gets into trouble, then gets out of it again. People love that story. They never get tired of it. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“You must bloom as a writer and I must bloom as a painter. Everything else about us is uninteresting.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
There were creative-writin g teachers long before there were creative-writin g courses, and they were called and continue to be called editors. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
The only way to get anything out of a writer's brains is to leave him or her alone until he or she… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Who is more to be pitied, a writer bound and gagged by policemen or one living in perfect freedom who has nothing… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
It pains me even now, even a million years later, to write about such human misbehaviour. A million years later, I feel… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Don't you think that's the main reason people find [writing] so difficult? If they can write complete sentences and can use a… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Mark Twain was so good with crowds that he became, in competition with singers and dancers and actors and acrobats, one of… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them -- in order that… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Talent is extremely common. What is rare is the willingness to endure the life of the writer. Writers have no one to… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
There is this thing called the university, and everybody goes there now. And there are these things called teachers who make students… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“I felt after I finished Slaughterhouse-Five that I didn’t have to write at all anymore if I didn’t want to. It was… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I realize that some of you may have come in hopes of hearing tips on how to become a professional writer. I… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
There was a message written in pencil on the tiles by the roller towel. This was it: What is the purpose of… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
If I were a younger man, I would write a history of human stupidity; and I would climb to the top of… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Somebody realized, hey, students are printing dummy ads and dummy news stories, why don't they really print something. So there was the… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I paraphrase Aristotle: If you want to be comical, write about people to whom the audience can feel superior; if you want… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
When I used to teach creative writing, I would tell the students to make their characters want something right away. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
The person who writes the bank's commercials is not the person who makes the loans. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I am a monopolar depressive descended from monopolar depressives. That's how come I write so good. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
[I write] intuitively, reflexively, as if skiing down a steep mountain slope with no time to think. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I say the same thing about the death of James Wait. "Oh, well -- he wasn't going to write the Beethoven's Ninth… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Our awareness is all that is alive and maybe sacred in any of us. Everything else about us is dead machinery. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Every sentence must do one of two things-reveal character or advance the action. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth," the long out-of-print science fiction writer went on.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Nothing ever really ends. That’s the horrible part of being in the short-story business—you have to be a real expert on ends.… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
A lot of critics think I'm stupid because my sentences are so simple and my method is so direct: they think these… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
That's the secret of how to enjoy writing and how to make yourself meet high standards," said Mrs. Berman. "You don't write… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I am beguiled by your physical beauty, and I am moved by how head-over-heels in love with books you are. And nowhere… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Did you ever admire an empty-headed writer for his or her mastery of the language? No. So your own winning style must… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I'm simply interested in what is going to happen next. I don't think I can control my life or my writing. Every… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
It's only recently that I've come to understand that writers are not marginal to our society, that they, in fact, do all… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them in order that the… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“You must bloom as a writer and I must bloom as a painter. Everything else about us is uninteresting.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Have a good nap, did you?” said the porter. “Yes,” said Billy. “Man,” said the porter, “you sure had a hard-on.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“I told him that if we doubted that we are demons in Hell, he should read The Mysterious Stranger, which Mark Twain wrote in… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Thomas Jefferson High School [..] His high school was named after a slave owner who was also one of the world’s greatest theoreticians on… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“I had a certain amount of skill as a dramatist, and Dr. Goebbels wanted me to use it” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I was some of the mud that got to sit up and look around. Lucky me, lucky mud. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“The town was Newport, Rhode Island, U.S.A., Earth, Solar System, Milky Way.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Her face was one of a kind, a surprising variation that made observers think, Yes--that would be another very nice way for people to… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“You finally fell in love, I see,” said Salo. “Only an Earthling year ago,” said Constant. “It took us that long to realize that… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“Like all Earthlings at the point of death, Mary Young sent faint reminders of herself to those who had known her. She released a… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“And contrast Mary Kathleen, if you will, with my wife Ruth, the Ophelia of the death camps, who believed that even the most intelligent… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Someday, someday, this crazy world will have to end, And our God will take things back that He to us did lend. And if,… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“They were going back to the slaughterhouse for souvenirs of the war.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“There are plenty of good reasons for fighting," I said, "but no good reason ever to hate without reservation, to imagine that God Almighty… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
![“Don't you think that's the main reason people find [writing] so difficult? If they can write complete sentences and can use a dictionary, isn't that the only reason they find writing hard: they don't know or care about anything?” quote by Kurt Vonnegut](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/9b3/kurt-vonnegut-41_care_don-t-you-think-that-s-the-main-reason-p_513943.jpg)
![“Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them -- in order that the reader may see what they are made of." [From the preface.]” quote by Kurt Vonnegut](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/5c1/kurt-vonnegut-41_adversity_be-a-sadist-no-matter-how-sweet-and-inno_2549345.jpg)
![“[I write] intuitively, reflexively, as if skiing down a steep mountain slope with no time to think.” quote by Kurt Vonnegut](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/f55/kurt-vonnegut-41_ifs_i-write-intuitively-reflexively-as-if-sk_771504.jpg)
![“Thomas Jefferson High School [..] His high school was named after a slave owner who was also one of the world’s greatest theoreticians on the subject of human liberty.” quote by Kurt Vonnegut](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/73a/kurt-vonnegut-41_freedom_thomas-jefferson-high-school-his-high-sc_9727.jpg)
