The blazing fire makes flames and brightness out of everything thrown into it.

…at seventeen I tried to write poetry confining myself solely to Anglo-Saxon words – don’t know if it helped, but it made me more concrete …

In quickness is truth. The more swiftly you write, the more honest you are. In hesitation is thought. In delay comes the effort for a style, instead of leaping upon truth which is the only...

Authors – trust in your vision.

One thing I know for sure about raising children is that every single day a kid needs discipline…. But also every single day a kid needs a break.

… And the only way to find that honesty is to not overthink it.For your writing to come alive–to be multi-dimensional–you must barter away some control.

Good writing just isn’t that common.

If a pen can communicate our thoughts, dreams, and emotions and be the voice of our soul, then ink is the medium that carries the message.

Stories not only give us a much needed practice on figuring out what makes people tick, they give us insight into how we tick.

I’m writing. The pages are starting to stack up. My morale is improving the more I feel like a writer.

There is an underlying rhythm to all text. Sentences crashing fall like the waves of the sea, and work unconsciously on the reader. Punctuation is the music of language. As a conductor can influence the...

The paradox of writing is that you’re trying to use words to express what words can’t express.

…each part of a story, each word if possible, was to work frontally as well as laterally… (“Conveyance: The Story I would Not Want Bill Wilson To Read”)

Don’t tell me the moon is shining, show me the glint of light on broken glass.

Don’t over edit. Don’t second-guess yourself, or your ideas. Just write. Write every day, and keep at it. Don’t get discouraged with the rejections. Tape them up on your office wall, to remind you of...

There is no bombast, no similes, flowers, digressions, or unnecessary descriptions. Everything tends directly to the catastrophe.

I always worked until I had something done and I always stopped when I knew what was going to happen next. That way I could be sure of going on the next day.

Telling a story is like playing a fiddle. No one want’s to hear it when it’s done badly

Each letter has a shape, she told them, one shape in the world and no other, and it is your responsibility to make it perfect.

Passionate attraction to someone of the opposite sex will make a hero or a fool of a novelist each time.

As Borges has taught us, all the books in the library are contemporary. Great poems are like granaries: they are always ready to enlarge their store.

How hard can writing be? After all, most of the words are going to be ‘and,’ ‘the,’ and ‘I,’ and ‘it,’ and so on, and there’s a huge number to choose from, so a lot...

Let your characters lead when you’re dancing together.

Don’t give in to doubt. Never be discouraged if your first draft isn’t what you thought it would be. Given skill and a story that compels you, muster your determination and make what’s on the...

Show, don’t tell,” but I stand by Show and Tell, because when writers put their work out into the world, they’re like kids bringing their broken unicorns and chewed-up teddy bears into class in the...

Love the work: the grind, the dreaming, the distracted not-sleep, all of it. It’s the one thing in the job that will always be there, and the real pleasure in the profession. Everything else is...

poems are small moments of enlightenment

T[he rules of writing] require that the episodes in a tale shall be necessary parts of the tale, and shall help to develop it.

Bulldogs are wonderful creatures to include in books. Besides their adorable bulldogishness, they provide the writer with a rare chance to use forms of the verb “snuffle.

Poetry expands the senses and keeps them in prime condition. It keeps you aware of your nose, your eye, your ear, your tongue, your hand.

So I have to create the whole thing afresh for myself each time. Probably all writers now are in the same boat. It is the penalty we pay for breaking with tradition, and the solitude...

All good writers write [terrible first drafts.] This is how they end up with good second drafts and terrific third drafts. . . I know some very great writers, writers you love who write beautifully...

…menulislah setiap hari, berpura-pura bahwa kau menerima gaji, berpura-pura bahwa kau harus menyerahkan sesuatu atau dipecat

In fact, one could argue that the skill of the fiction writer boils down to the ability to exploit intensity.

You must write as if Dostoyevsky himself will be reading your novel, and Shakespeare will be acting it out.

…what draws us into a story and keeps us there is the firing of our dopamine neurons, signaling that intriguing information is on the way.

Doing it all the time, whether or not we are in the mood, gives us ownership of our writing ability. It takes it out of the realm of conjuring where we stand on the rock...

Most—but not all—of the writers I knew then were young men who cherished their independence, were unconcerned about job security, and were serious about their writing. They didn’t want to be anyone’s employee if it...

Writer’s block? I’ve never heard of a plumber complain about plumber’s block.

You might say as you tirelessly said of my stories, at least of the adjectives, that I should render the evidence, not render the verdict… (“Conveyance: The Story I would Not Want Bill Wilson To...

I tell everyone who asks me about writing…almost everyone has an idea for a book, and some even have a great ending, but it’s that 290 or so pages in between that are tough!

Remember that you don’t write a story because you have an idea but because you have a believable character.

Depend upon it, after all, Thomas, Literature is the most noble of professions. In fact, it is about the only one fit for a man. For my own part, there is no seducing me from...

However great a man’s natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.

There’s no right way of writing. There’s only your way.

How many great gems were lost to thoughtand not put down to pen.You can but think of just a fewand then they’re lost again.

A writer needs to ingest love to be passionate. Passion is a metabolite of love, and good writing is an active metabolite of passion.

Don’t write with a pen. Ink tends to give the impression the words shouldn’t be changed.Write with what gives you the most sensual satisfaction.Write in a hard-covered notebook with green lined pages. Green is easy...

Rules such as ‘Write what you know,’ and ‘Show, don’t tell,’ while doubtlessly grounded in good sense, can be ignored with impunity by any novelist nimble enough to get away with it. There is, in...

If grammar is the skeleton of expression and usage the flesh and blood, then style is the personality.