So where do the ideas actually come from? Mostly from getting annoyed about things. Not big issues so much … as the little irritations that drive you wild out of all proportion.
– Douglas Adams
Tag: ideas
Quotable 217
Basically, fiction is about people. You can’t write fiction about ideas.
– Theodore Sturgeon
Quotable 214
No matter what people tell you, words and ideas can change the world.
– Nancy H. Kleinbaum
(said by Robin Williams in Dead Poets Society)
Quotable 42
The only way to get ideas for stories is to drink way too much coffee and buy a desk that doesn’t collapse when you beat your head against it.
— Douglas Adams
Pen to Paper: Generating Ideas
Where do you get your ideas?
That’s a popular question to ask writers. Some, weary of answering, claim to have hired a service to send ten or fifteen a week. Harlan Ellison famously answered: “Schenectady.”
I can track down the inspiration for some of my stories; others surprise me as much as, if not more than, they do the reader. Some quick examples for ones I know about: