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Throughout all of the changes that have happened in my life, one of the priorities I've had is to never change the way I write songs and the reasons I write songs. I write songs to help me understand life a little more. I write songs to get past things that cause me pain. And I write songs because sometimes life makes more sense to me when it's being sung in a chorus, and when I can write it in a verse.
Taylor SwiftI can write anywhere. I write in airports. I write on airplanes. I've written in the back seats of taxis. I write in hotel rooms. I love hotel rooms. I just write wherever I am whenever I need to write.
Garrison KeillorTo disguise nothing, to conceal nothing, to write about those things that are closest to our pain, our happiness; to write about our sexual clumsiness, the agonies of Tantalus, the depth of our discouragement-what we glimpse in our dreams-our despair. To write about the foolish agonies of anxiety, the refreshment of our strength when these are ended; to write about our painful search for self, jeopardized by a stranger in the post office, a half-seen face in a train window, to write about the continents and populations of our dreams, about love and death, good and evil, the end of the world.
John CheeverI write about the power of trying, because I want to be okay with failing. I write about generosity because I battle selfishness. I write about joy because I know sorrow. I write about faith because I almost lost mine, and I know what it is to be broken and in need of redemption. I write about gratitude because I am thankful - for all of it.
Kristin ArmstrongWe also write to heighten our own awareness of life... We write to taste life twice, in the moment, and in retrospection... We write to be able to transcend our life, to reach beyond it...to teach ourselves to speak with others, to record the journey into the labyrinth. We write to expand our world when we feel strangled, or constricted, or lonely... When I don't write, I feel my world shrinking... I feel I lose my fire and my color.
Anais NinI try to write for highest common denominator. I don't write for dumb people. I figure if everybody doesn't get it, that's OK. Someone bright enough will get it, and that's who I write for. It's probably not the way to make million-sellers. What can I say? I won't apologize for trying to write for smart people.
Paul WesterbergWrite. Write every day. Write honestly. Write something that doesnโt exist, and you wish did. Read. Learn. Study. Watch people. Listen to what they say, listen to how they say it and listen to what they do not say. Surprise yourself. Scare yourself.
Brian Michael BendisAsk how to live? Write, write, write, anything; The world's a fine believing world, write news.
John FletcherThe scene that scares you the most, that you don't want to write because it's the most difficult to write-that's the one you have to write. So I think when people have writer's block, it's because what they have to write scares them. And that's usually the heart of the book.
Marcy DermanskySomeone wanted me to write a profile for ESPN about the commissioner of baseball, and I said, "He's just some suit! Some Republican. No!" I mean if you want me to write about baseball, boxing or football, I'll write about those things because I watch them, I think about them a lot and I like them. But I don't want to write about Barry Bonds.
Richard FordEarly on my career, I figured out that I just have to write the book I have to write at that moment. Whatever else is going on in the culture is just not that important. If you could get the culture to write your book, that would be great. But the culture can't write your book.
Colson WhiteheadListen carefully to the feedback your readers give you. Dont write unless people want you to write, a lot of people write just because they want to write.
Max LucadoMy advice to young writers would be to write every day, even if it is only a few words. Get yourself on the habit of writing and it will become a lifelong one. And find a place to write where you are physically comfortable. You can't concentrate if you aren't. Ernest Hemingway could only write standing up, and Truman Capote could only write lying down!
Cassandra ClareI like to write about things that are extreme in some form. I like to write about something I feel I have to write about.
Suzanne VegaWell, I hate it when authors come into a school and they say to kids, 'Write from your heart, only write what you know, and write from your heart.' I hate that because it's useless. I've written over 300 books - not one was written from my heart. Not one. They were all written for an audience, they were all written to entertain a certain audience.
R. L. StineYou don't write because someone sets assignments! You write because you need to write, or because you hope someone will listen or because writing will mend something broken inside you or bring something back to life.
Joanne HarrisA song that sounds simple is just not that easy to write. One of the objectives of this record was to try and write melodies that continue to resonate...Everything that happens to you influences your writing...The writing process for me is pretty much always the same-it's a solitary experience...I have yet to write that one song that defines my career...Beck said he didn't believe in the theory of a song coming through you as if you were an open vessel. I agree with him to a certain extent.
Sheryl CrowSometimes I feel as if I am read before I write. When I write a poem about my mother, Palestinians think my mother is a symbol for Palestine. But I write as a poet, and my mother is my mother. She's not a symbol.
Mahmoud DarwishWhen authors who write literary fiction begin to write screenplays, everybody assumes that's the end. Here's another who's never going to write well again.
Richard RussoWith Twitter and Instagram and all of these vehicles where fans can directly interact with you and get your attention, there's a little bit of an entitlement. Like, "Why won't you follow me or write me back?" Well, if I write you back, then I have to write everyone back.
Ingrid MichaelsonWrite what you know. Write what you don't know. But most of all, write what you'd rather not know.
Sam LipsyteIn order to write the book you want to write, in the end you have to become the person you need to become to write that book.
Junot DiazAsk yourself, what makes my book so different? So interesting? Donโt write to be a best seller. Write for and from your heart, not your wallet. Write something you want to be remembered by.
Leon NacsonThere are, first of all, two kinds of authors: those who write for the subject's sake, and those who write for writing's sake. ... The truth is that when an author begins to write for the sake of covering paper, he is cheating the reader; because he writes under the pretext that he has something to say.
Arthur SchopenhauerYou cannot write well or much (and I venture the opinion that you cannot write well unless you write much) unless you form a habit.
W. Somerset MaughamThe writing is done on the computer, and the drawing is done by hand. I write, write, write, then I hit the illustration.
Stephan PastisIf I was gonna write a book that was true, and I was gonna write a book that was honest, then I was gonna have to write about myself in very, very negative ways.
James Frey(W)hat I write when I force myself is generally just as good as what I write when I'm feeling inspired. It's mainly a matter of forcing yourself to write.
Tom WolfeWrite, if you must; not otherwise. Do not write, if you can earn a fair living at teaching or dressmaking, at electricity or hod-carrying. Make shoes, weed cabbages, survey land, keep house, make ice-cream, sell cake, climb a telephone pole. Nay, be a lightning-rod peddler or a book agent, before you set your heart upon it that you shall write for a living.... Living? It is more likely to be dying by your pen; despairing by your pen; burying hope and heart and youth and courage in your ink-stand.
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps WardIn music industry they always want you to write something like the one that was popular. And that's something you kind of have to just - sometimes you just say yes to people, like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure," and then you just write the one you want to write.
Benji MaddenI feel as though I never had choice not to be a writer. I feel in my heart of hearts that writing chose me and this is what I must do. I have no choice but to write, and to write, and to write, because my very life depends on it. And to assume that, of course, everyone in the entire universe wants to read what I've written.
Jerdine NolenI've never been that person who thought that because I've written one novel, I should write another and another. It's only when there was another novel to write that I was going to write another.
Arundhati RoySometimes people say to me, โI want to write, but I have five kids, a full-time job, a wife who beats me, a tremendous debt to my parents,โ and so on. I say to them, โThere is no excuse. If you want to write, write. This is your life. You are responsible for it. You will not live forever. Donโt wait. Make the time now, even if it is ten minutes once a week."
Natalie GoldbergThe people who review my books, generally, are kind of youngish culture writers who aspire to write books, or write opinion pieces about what they think of Neil Young, or why they quit watching ER or whatever. And because of that, I think there's a lot of people who write about my books with the premise of, "Why this guy? Why not me?"
Chuck KlostermanWhen I first started writing, there was no way I'd write a sex scene. That just seemed impossible. That's why in "Fight Club" all the sex happens off-screen. It's all just a noise on the other side of the wall or the ceiling. I just couldn't bring to write in a scene like that. So one of the challenges with "Choke" was I wanted to write sex scenes until I was really comfortable just writing them in a very mechanical way.
Chuck PalahniukWhat you want is practice, practice, practice. It doesnโt matter what we write (at least this is my view) at our age, so long as we write continually as well as we can. I feel that every time I write a page either of prose or of verse, with real effort, even if itโs thrown into the fire the next minute, I am so much further on.
C. S. LewisThere are no limitations with a song. To me a song is a little piece of art. It can be whatever you like it to be. You can write the simplest song, and that's lovely, or you can just write a song that is abstract art. ... A lot of my songs are very serious, I'm like dead serious about certain things and I feel that I'm writing about the world, through my own eyes. ... I have a love for simple basic song structure, although sometimes you'd never know it. ... Most of the songs I wrote at night. I would just wake in the middle of the night. That's when I found the space to write.
Laura NyroAnd write what you love - dont feel pressured to write serious prose if what you like is to be funny. You're a reader as well as a writer, so write what you'd want to read.
Cassandra ClareLetterwriting is the natural outlet of the "odds." The busy-bodies, the idle, the perverted, the cranks, the feel-it-my-duties ... Also the plain depraved. They all write letters. It's their safe outlet, you see. They can be as interfering, as long-winded, as obscene, as pompous, as one-idea'd, as they like on paper, and no one can kick them for it. So they write. My God, how they write!
Josephine TeyI write everything down. I e-mail the second I think of something, or I write notes in my BlackBerry calendar. I set up reminder alerts on my phone. And I have a notebook by my bedside so I can write down any last-minute ideas.
Giada De LaurentiisThe definition of a writing career, is write a book, write another book, write another book
Holly LisleBeing in unfamiliar places has no effect on my writing, except that it often means I'm caught up in the logistics of travel, the places and people on the spot, etc., etc., which can mean that I don't have the time to write. But I try, wherever I am, to take a couple of hours in the early evening to go off and write. Because I never write from personal experience, per se, where I am makes no difference except for this element of available time.
Cole SwensenAny woman or man who would write the truth of their lives would write a great work. But no one has dared to write the truth of their lives.
Isadora DuncanThe single most important technique for making progress is to write ten words. Doesn't matter if you're badly stuck, or your day is completely jam-packed, or you're away from your computer - carry a small paper notebook and write a sentence of description while you're waiting on line at a coffee shop. I think of this as baiting a hook. Even if you have a few days in a row where nothing comes except those ten words, I find that as long as you have to think about the novel enough to write ten words, the chances are that more will come.
Naomi NovikNo complaining about how hard it is to write, we are all so, so lucky to write, to sit down, inside, and write words on paper. There is no greater freedom, no greater good, nothing that brings more joy.
Isabel AllendeMy writing isn't actually guided by issues. I know it seems that way, but I don't sit down and think, Oh, there's this issue I'm bothered about. I only write about things that directly impact my life. When I write, there's a pain that I have to reach, and a release I have to work toward for myself. So it's really a question of the particular emotional circumstance that I want to express, a character that appears, a moment in time, and then I write the play backwards.
Paula VogelThere's a variety and depth to the song topics I get to write about in children's music and books: being able to write about things I wouldn't normally write about, like a disappointing pancake, or monsters or opposite day is really different than writing about heartbreak and relationships.
Lisa Loeb