Heaven knows what pains the author has been at, what bitter experience he has endured and what heartache suffered, to give some chance reader a few hours' relaxation or to while away the tedium of a journey.
The trouble with young writers is that they are all in their sixties.
We do not write as we want, but as we can.
It has been said that good prose should resemble the conversation of a well-bred man.
The ideas for stories that thronged my brain would not let me rest till I had got rid of them by writing them.
The writer is more concerned to know than to judge.
Writing is a wholetime job: no professional writer can afford only to write when he feels like it.
A good rule for writers: do not explain overmuch.
What I'm trying to tell you is that there are men who are possessed by an urge so strong to do some particular thing that they can't help themselves, they've got to do it. They're prepared to sacrifice everything to satisfy their yearning.
People do tell a writer things that they don't tell others. I don't know why, unless it is that having read one or two of his books they feel on peculiarly intimate terms with him; or it may be that they dramatize themselves and, seeing themselves as it were as characters in a novel, are ready to be as open with him as they imagine the characters of his invention are.
Because a man can write great works he is none the less a man.
No author can create a character out of nothing. He must have a model to give him a starting point; but then his imagination goes to work, he builds him up, adding a trait here, a trait there, which his model did not possess.
The secret of play-writing can be given in two maxims: stick to the point, and, whenever you can, cut.
No one can write a best seller by trying to. He must write with complete sincerity; the clichés that make you laugh, the hackneyed characters, the well-worn situations, the commonplace story that excites your derision, seem neither hackneyed, well worn nor commonplace to him. ... The conclusion is obvious: you cannot write anything that will convince unless you are yourself convinced. The best seller sells because he writes with his heart's blood.
You cannot write unless you write much.
There is a sort of man who pays no attention to his good actions, but is tormented by his bad ones. This is the type that most often writes about himself.
To write simply is as difficult as to be good.
I write only when inspiration strikes. Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o'clock sharp.
Writing is the supreme solace.
Habits in writing as in life are only useful if they are broken as soon as they cease to be advantageous.
It's very hard to be a gentleman and a writer.
The best style is the style you don't notice.
Words have weight, sound and appearance; it is only by considering these that you can write a sentence that is good to look at and good to listen to.
A good style should show no signs of effort. What is written should seem a happy accident.
We do not write because we want to; we write because we have to.
There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.
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.
If you can tell stories, create characters, devise incidents, and have sincerity and passion, it doesn't matter a damn how you write.
Imagination grows by exercise, and contrary to common belief, is more powerful in the mature than in the young.
There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately no one knows what they are.