Ability Quote by Anonymous

I have a great editor and I enjoy, in a masochistic way, being ruthless about my own performance. How do I know, but I…

— Ralph Fiennes

I'm a writer, not an editor, and though the editing rarely cut into my writing time, it did take away from that walking-around-thinking-about-it-when-you're-not-thinking-about-it time…

— Ben Fountain

You must be unintimidated by your own thoughts because if you write with someone looking over you shoulder, you'll never write.

— Nikki Giovanni

I don't think about the reader when I'm writing, but I do when I'm editing, of course. For instance, I self-consciously didn't want to…

— Sheila Heti

When you write it doesn't occur to you that somebody could think different from what you do.

— Howard Nemerov

Unless you are in the willingness and ease and ecstasy of some kind of moment, you may end up the editor of your thoughts…

— Alex Ebert

I don't feel real confident expressing myself except when I'm writing. I feel kind of scatterbrained. I can see everything from both sides and…

— Conor Oberst

We writers don't really think about whether what we write is good or not. It's too much to worry about. We just put the…

— Garrison Keillor

We think that we've gotten better over time editing ourselves, and when something doesn't feel right you kind of go, 'Let's put it to…

— Russell Mael

I think it's very hard to reconcile oneself to the notion that it may not matter what you think if you still want to…

— Lynne Tillman

I formed a resolution to never write a word I did not want to write; to think only of my own tastes and ideals,…

— C. S. Forester

When you're editing, you want to be the perfect appreciator, not another writer.

— Joseph Kanon