Writing Quotes by Madeleine L'Engle

A book comes and says, 'Write me.

— Madeleine L'Engle

You have to write the book that wants to be written,

— Madeleine L'Engle

You learn to write by doing it.

— Madeleine L'Engle

To write for children at all is an act of faith.

— Madeleine L'Engle

It's not my brain that's writing the book, it's these hands of mine.

— Madeleine L'Engle

Inspiration does not always precede the act of writing; it often follows it.

— Madeleine L'Engle

“You are given the form, but you must write the sonnet for yourself.”

— Madeleine L'Engle

“You're given the form, but you have to write the sonnet yourself. What you say is completely up to you.”

— Madeleine L'Engle

If you want to write, you need to keep an honest, unpublishable journal that nobody reads, nobody but you.

— Madeleine L'Engle

“If a book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.”

— Madeleine L'Engle

If I have something I want to say that is too difficult for adults to swallow, then I will write it in…

— Madeleine L'Engle

With each book I write, I become more and more convinced that the books have a life of their own, quite apart…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“One of the most helpful tools a writer has is his journals. Whenever someone asks how to become an author, I suggest…

— Madeleine L'Engle

I believe that good questions are more important than answers, and the best children's books ask questions, and make the readers ask…

— Madeleine L'Engle

Because I am a storyteller I live by words. Perhaps music is a purer art form. It may be that when we…

— Madeleine L'Engle

I know writers who write only when inspiration comes. How would Isaac Stern play if he played the violin only when he…

— Madeleine L'Engle

Life, with its rules, its obligations, and its freedoms, is like a sonnet: You're given the form, but you have to write…

— Madeleine L'Engle

Poetry, at least the kind I write, is written out of immediate need; it is written out of pain, joy, and experience…

— Madeleine L'Engle

No matter how true I believe what I am writing to be, if the reader cannot also participate in that truth, then…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“The artist, if he is not to forget how to listen, must retain the visionwhich includes angels and dragons and unicorns, and…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“We, and I think I'm speaking for many writers, don't know what it is that sometimes comes to make our books alive.…

— Madeleine L'Engle

When the artist is truly the servant of the work, the work is better than the artist; Shakespeare knew how to listen…

— Madeleine L'Engle

I think that all artists, regardless of degree of talent, are a painful, paradoxical combination of certainty and uncertainty, of arrogance and…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“A winter ago I had an after-school seminar for high-school students and in one of the early sessions Una, a brilliant fifteen-year-old,…

— Madeleine L'Engle

When I have something to say that I think will be too difficult for adults, I write it in a book for…

— Madeleine L'Engle

If I have something I want to say that is too difficult for adults to swallow, then I write it in a…

— Madeleine L'Engle

When we are writing, or painting, or composing, we are, during the time of creativity, freed from normal restrictions, and are opened…

— Madeleine L'Engle

The rational intellect doesn't have a great deal to do with love, and it doesn't have a great deal to do with…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“I have advice for people who want to write. I don't care whether they're 5 or 500. There are three things that…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“I heard a famous author say once that the hardest part of writing a book was making yourself sit down at the…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“If the work comes to the artist and says, 'Here I am, serve me,' then the job of the artist, great or…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“The artist is a servant who is willing to be a birthgiver. In a very real sense the artist (male or female)…

— Madeleine L'Engle

“Someone said, 'It's all been done before.' Yes, I agreed, but we all have to say it in our own voice.”

— Madeleine L'Engle

The discipline of creation, be it to paint, compose, write, is an effort towards wholeness.

— Madeleine L'Engle

Just write a little bit every day. Even if it's for only half an hour — write, write, write.

— Madeleine L'Engle

If you want to write, you need to keep an honest, unpublishable journal that nobody reads, nobody but you. Where you just…

— Madeleine L'Engle

Our truest response to the irrationality of the world is to paint or sing or write, for only in such response do…

— Madeleine L'Engle

We find what we are looking for. If we are looking for life and love and openness and growth, we are likely…

— Madeleine L'Engle

You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then…

— Madeleine L'Engle

Stories have a richness that goes way beyond fact. My writing knows more than I know. What a writer must do is…

— Madeleine L'Engle