The secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components.

Don’t try to visualize the great mass audience. There is no such audience—every reader is a different person.

Every time you look at a blank piece of paper, you're doing something new. You have to step onto that blank territory and remind yourself the sky didn't fall in the last time you wrote. Writing is a question of overcoming your fears-and everybody has them.

I think a sentence is a fine thing to put a preposition at the end of.

The best way to learn to write is to study the work of the men and women who are doing the kind of writing you want to do.

Never hesitate to imitate another writer. Imitation is part of the creative process for anyone learning an art or a craft. Bach and Picasso didn't spring full-blown as Bach or Picasso; they needed models. This is especially true of writing.

Writing wasn't easy and wasn't fun. It was hard and lonely, and the words seldom just flowed.