I have seen enough writers get stuck by not being vigilant enough about the tendency of their own work to repeat itself.
– J.H. Prynne
Tag: work
Quotable 491
The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.
– Mary Oliver
Quotable 447
There’s a saying in all writers’ rooms – it’s either fear or faith. You’re either trying to satisfy your guess about other people’s expectations, or you’re working through the genuine and authentic possibilities of the material.
– David Milch
Quotable 430
To write you have to have stories you want to tell, you have to keep your mind alive, and you have to work hard.
– Tracy Kidder
Quotable 421
The continually reassuring thing is that we’re all novices when we start a new work.
– Alice McDermott
Quotable 419
I can always write. Sometimes, to be sure, what I write is crap, but it’s words on the page and therefore it is something to work with.
– Geraldine Brooks
Quotable 332
Story problems are going to happen. If you never have story problems it means you’re not working hard enough to tell stories in an original, surprising, unexpected way.
– Ken Levine
Quotable 318
The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.
– Emile Zola
Quotable 279
I work on the assumption, or the fear, that the reader will stop reading if I stop being interesting.
– Clive James
Quotable 275
Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it.
– Madeleine L’Engle