Perfection is like chasing the horizon. Keep moving. Neil Gaiman
In any art you’re allowed to steal anything if you can make it better. Ernest Hemingway
Don’t ever write a novel unless it hurts like a hot turd coming out. Charles Bukowski
If you write what you yourself sincerely think and feel and are interested in, the chances are very high that you will interest other people as well. Rachel Carson
Show up, show up, show up, and after a while the muse shows up, too. Isabel Allende
The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is.. to help man endure by lifting his heart. William Faulkner
As Neil Gaiman taught me, the best way to defeat writer’s block is to get really bored. Seth Godin
The only environment the artist needs is whatever peace, whatever solitude, and whatever pleasure he can get at not too high a cost. William Faulkner
In the wholeheartedness of concentration, world and self begin to cohere. With that state comes an enlarging: of what may be known, what may be felt, what may be done. Jane Hirshfield
Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia. Kurt Vonnegut
Finish each day before you begin the next, and interpose a solid wall of sleep between the two. This you cannot do without temperance. Ralph Waldo Emerson
A poet should be so crafty with words that he is envied even for his pains. Criss Jami
At the end of the day your ability to connect with your readers comes down to how you make them feel. Benjamin J. Carey
At its best, the sensation of writing is that of any unmerited grace. It is handed to you, but only if you look for it. You search, you break your heart, your back, your brain, and then — and only then — it is handed to you. Annie Dillard
To write well about the elegant world you have to know it and experience it to the depths of your being just as Proust, Radiguet and Fitzgerald did: what matters is not whether you love it or hate it, but only to be quite clear about your position regarding it. Italo Calvino
When you’re trying to create a career as a writer, a little delusional thinking goes a long way. Michael Lewis
There is a great deal that either has to be given up or be taken away from you if you are going to succeed in writing a body of work. Susan Sontag
A writer, like an athlete, must ‘train’ every day. What did I do today to keep in ‘form’? Susan Sontag
Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life. Anne Lamott
It’s by writing.. by stepping back a bit from the real thing to look at it, that we are most present. Alison Bechdel
Truth that is naked is the most beautiful, and the simpler its expression the deeper is the impression it makes. Arthur Schopenhauer
Only a person who is congenially self-centered has the effrontery and the stamina to write essays. E.B. White
A problem with a piece of writing often clarifies itself if you go for a long walk. Helen Dunmore
You have to finish things — that’s what you learn from, you learn by finishing things. Neil Gaiman
I want my stories to move people… to feel some kind of reward from the writing. Alice Munroe
Don’t be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand. Henry Miller
