QUOTES ON WRITING

I am currently reading an e-book titled About Writing by Michael LaRocca. It’s a great book for those who want to improve their writing. In it are some quotes by writers. Some are instructive, some comical and some downright ludicrous. I had to go on the web to check out the bios of some of those writers and see what made them impressive.  Enjoy the snippets.

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"Everywhere I go, I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them." Flannery O'Connor

Mary Flannery O'Connor (March 25, 1925 – August 3, 1964) 

An American writer and essayist, she was an important voice in American literature. With two novels, 32 short stories, as well as a number of reviews and commentaries, her Complete Stories won the 1972 U.S. National Book Award for Fiction. She was named the "Best of the National Book Awards" by internet visitors in 2009.

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• I write fiction because it's a way of making statements I can disown, and I write plays because dialogue is the most respectable way of contradicting myself. Tom Stoppard
• It is always a good idea, in any type of writing, to imagine what it's like to be the reader. Carl Dickson
• An editor is someone who separates the wheat from the chaff and then prints the chaff. Adlai Stevenson

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Some editors are failed writers, but so are most writers. T.S. Eliot

Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 1888 – 4 January 1965) 

I encountered his writing for the 1st time at the university when we read one of his well-known plays, Murder in the Cathedral (1935). An essayist, publisher, playwright, literary and social critic, He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948, "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry."

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• It has been said that there is no great writing, only great rewriting. Michael LaRocca
• It is impossible to discourage the real writers - they don't give a damn what you say, they're going to write. Sinclair Lewis
• When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing. Enrique Jardiel Poncela
• Easy reading is damn hard writing. Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Writing comes more easily if you have something to say. Sholem Asch

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I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters. Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright(June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959)

He was known more as a reknown American architect of his time. He was also an interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1000 structures and completed 532 works. Wright authored 20 books and many articles and was a popular lecturer in the United States and in Europe. He was recognized in 1991 by the American Institute of Architects as "the greatest American architect of all time. one of his most popular architectural designs was the Falling Water.

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• I can't understand why a person will take a year or two to write a novel when he can easily buy one for a few dollars. Fred Allen
• Writers have a rare power not given to anyone else; we can bore people long after we are dead. Sinclair Lewis

Enjoy God’s Exceeding Grace