Creativity And Writing Quotes:

First, find out what your hero wants, then just follow him.

- Ray Bradbury

topic: Hero, Writing, Firsts, Inspiration To Write, Great Writing

I have been successful probably because I have always realized that I knew nothing about writing and have merely tried to tell an interesting story entertainingly.

- Edgar Rice Burroughs

topic: Writing, Successful, Interesting, Story Writers, Interesting Stories

Anecdotes don't make good stories. Generally I dig down underneath them so far that the story that finally comes out is not what people thought their anecdotes were about.

- Alice Munro

topic: Writing, People, Anecdotes, Story Writers, Story Writing

You learn by writing short stories. Keep writing short stories. The money's in novels, but writing short stories keeps your writing lean and pointed.

- Larry Niven

topic: Writing, Stories, Novel, Novel Writing, Inspiration To Write

I am irritated by my own writing. I am like a violinist whose ear is true, but whose fingers refuse to reproduce precisely the sound he hears within.

- Gustave Flaubert

topic: Writing, Sound, Ears, Novel Writing, Writing Fiction

A blank piece of paper is God's way of telling us how hard it is to be God.

- Sidney Sheldon

topic: Writing, Paper, Way, Learning How To Write, Writing By Writers

Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere.

- Anne Lamott

topic: Writing, Effort, Needs, Starting To Write, Great Writing

To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme.

- Herman Melville

topic: Book, Writing, Produce, Writing Advice, Writing Short

Everybody walks past a thousand story ideas every day. The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them. Most people don't see any.

- Orson Scott Card

topic: Writing, Past, Ideas, Novel Writing, Inspiration To Write

Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending.

- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

topic: Art, Writing, I Ll Miss You, Beginnings And Ends, Inspirational New Beginning

I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again.

- Oscar Wilde

topic: Morning, Writing, Perfection, Writing And Reading, Creativity And Writing

All the words I use in my stories can be found in the dictionary-it's just a matter of arranging them into the right sentences.

- W. Somerset Maugham

topic: Writing, Use, Matter, Story Writers, Story Writing

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written.

- Oscar Wilde

topic: Book, Reading, Writing, Great Writing, Libraries Books And Reading

An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.

- Oscar Wilde

topic: Funny, Witty, Writing, Inspire Creativity, Big Ideas

If you write one story, it may be bad; if you write a hundred, you have the odds in your favor.

- Edgar Rice Burroughs

source: "King of the Jungle" by John J. Miller, reason.com. August/September 1999.

topic: Writing, Odds, Stories, Novel Writing, Story Writers

Exercise the writing muscle every day, even if it is only a letter, notes, a title list, a character sketch, a journal entry. Writers are like dancers, like athletes. Without that exercise, the muscles seize up.

- Jane Yolen

topic: Character, Writing, Athlete, Successful Writing, Writing By Writers

Literature is all, or mostly, about sex.

- Anthony Burgess

topic: Sex, Writing, Literature, Writing By Writers, Creativity And Writing

Imperfections are not inadequacies; they are reminders that we're all in this together.

- Brené Brown

source: Brené Brown (2010). “The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are”, p.76, Simon and Schuster

topic: Imperfection, Together, Reminders, Creativity And Writing, Inadequacy

The work never matches the dream of perfection the artist has to start with.

- William Faulkner

topic: Dream, Writing, Artist, Novel Writing, Writing Fiction

Begin with an individual, and before you know it you have created a type; begin with a type, and you find you have created - nothing.

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

topic: Writing, Individual, Type, Writing Fiction, Famous Writers

There's no such thing as writer's block. That was invented by people in California who couldn't write.

- Terry Pratchett

topic: Block, Writing, California, Writing Fiction, Writer's Block

Everyday we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read the lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our own criterion of truth and beauty. Everyman, when he gets quiet, when he becomes desperately honest with himself, is capable of uttering profound truths.

- Henry Miller

topic: Inspirational, Life, Believe, Truth And Beauty, Everyman

You don't have to get it right the first time.

- Barbara Sher

topic: Time, Firsts, First Time, Twentieth Century, Parachutes

Most writers regard the truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are economical in its use.

- Mark Twain

topic: Inspirational, Funny, Writing, Inspiration To Write, Writing By Writers

Get it down. Take chances. It may be bad, but it's the only way you can do anything good.

- William Faulkner

topic: Inspiring, Writing, May, Inspiration And Creativity, Inspiration To Write

How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.

- Henry David Thoreau

topic: Life, Beautiful, Book, Inspiration To Write, Creative Writing

It begins with a character, usually, and once he stands up on his feet and begins to move, all I can do is trot along behind him with a paper and pencil trying to keep up long enough to put down what he says and does.

- William Faulkner

topic: Moving, Character, Writing, Writing Fiction, Paper And Pencil

No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader.

- Ernest Hemingway

source: "The Figure a Poem Makes". Book by Ernest Hemingway, 1939.

topic: Reading, Book, Writing, Story Writers, Story Writing

Literature is an occupation in which you have to keep proving your talent to people who have none

- Jules Renard

topic: Success, People, Literature, Creative Writing, Reading And Writing

Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

- Oscar Wilde

topic: Book, Literature, Wells, Great Writing, Libraries Books And Reading

My own experience is that once a story has been written, one has to cross out the beginning and the end. It is there that we authors do most of our lying.

- Anton Chekhov

topic: Lying, Writing, Stories, Novel Writing, Story Writers

Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.

- John Steinbeck

topic: Inspirational, Wisdom, Couple, Innovation And Business, Inspirational And Innovation

Suit the action to the word, the word to the action.

- William Shakespeare

topic: Writing, Crafts, Suits, Words And Actions, Creativity And Writing

The unread story is not a story; it is little black marks on wood pulp. The reader, reading it, makes it live: a live thing, a story.

- Ursula K. Le Guin

topic: Book, Reading, Writing, Story Writers, Story Writing

There's no money in poetry, but then there's no poetry in money, either.

- Robert Graves

source: Robert Graves, Frank L. Kersnowski (1989). “Conversations with Robert Graves”, p.71, Univ. Press of Mississippi

topic: Money, Writing, Poetry, Novel Writing, Writing Poetry

Don't think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It's self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can't try to do things. You simply must do things.

- Ray Bradbury

topic: Creativity, Thinking, Self, Amazing Things, Creative People

You can't try to do things; you simply must do them.

- Ray Bradbury

topic: Thinking Of You, Writing, Creativity, Amazing Things, Creative People

Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.

- E. L. Doctorow

topic: Writing, Journey, Night, Novel Writing, Learning How To Write

People tend to forget that my presence runs counter to their best interests. And it always does. That is one last thing to remember. Writers are always selling somebody out.

- Joan Didion

topic: Running, People, Lasts, Writing By Writers, Famous Writers

Finishing a book is just like you took a child out in the back yard and shot it.

- Truman Capote

topic: Children, Book, Writing, Writers And Writing, Finishing A Book

To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it's about, but the inner music that words make.

- Truman Capote

source: Truman Capote, M. Thomas Inge (1987). “Truman Capote: Conversations”, p.88, Univ. Press of Mississippi

topic: Music, Writing, Creativity, Great Writing, Creativity And Writing

The only thing I was fit for was to be a writer, and this notion rested solely on my suspicion that I would never be fit for real work, and that writing didn't require any.

- Russell Baker

source: Russell Baker (2011). “Growing Up”, p.157, RosettaBooks

topic: Real, Work, Writing, Creativity And Writing

I don't wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has got to get down to work.

- Pearl S. Buck

topic: Life, Beautiful, Work, Procrastinating, Creative Work

The only reason for being a professional writer is that you can't help it.

- Leo Rosten

topic: Writing, Helping, Reason, Story Writers, Writing By Writers

To draw you must close your eyes and sing.

- Pablo Picasso

topic: Art, Eye, Drawing, Creativity And Writing

The chief enemy of creativity is 'good' sense.

- Pablo Picasso

topic: Life, Beautiful, Art, Creative People, Creative Artists

The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas.

- Linus Pauling

topic: Inspiring, Education, Business, Inspiration To Write, Logical Ideas

You get ideas from daydreaming. You get ideas from being bored. You get ideas all the time. The only difference between writers and other people is we notice when we're doing it.

- Neil Gaiman

topic: Writing, Ideas, Differences, Creativity And Writing

Almost anyone can be an author; the business is to collect money and fame from this state of being.

- A. A. Milne

topic: Success, Writing, Fame, Novel Writing, Money And Fame