Composition Quote by Elmore Leonard

“I can't allow what we learned in English composition to disrupt the sound and rhythm of the narrative.”

— Elmore Leonard

If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.

— Elmore Leonard

It has always seemed to me that if you could talk about your work in fully-formed phrases, you wouldn't write it. The writing is…

— Hortense Calisher

Writing by myself, I spread that out more. I'll spend more time on a song then. I'm more critical about it, because there's no…

— Hunter Hayes

Writing is so much about rhythm. If you've got another rhythm in the room, it spoils the rhythm of the words.

— Viv Albertine

Apart from a few simple principles, the sound and rhythm of English prose seem to me matters where both writers and readers should trust…

— F. L. Lucas

“The writer's job is to turn the unspeakable into words - not just any words, but, if you can, into rhythm and blues.”

— Anne Lamott

The art of writing is not, as many seem to imagine, the art of bringing fine phrases into rhythmical order, but the art of…

— George Henry Lewes

Writing shouldn't come between the reader and what's being described. It should be as transparent as possible.

— Diana Athill

We write to expose the unexposed. If there is one door in the castle you have been told not to go through, you must.…

— Anne Lamott

“All narrative begins for me as listening. When I read, I listen. When I write, I listen—for silence, inflection, rhythm, rest.”

— Toni Morrison

Whatever works for the piece I'm thinking about is the way I write.

— Glenn Branca