Writing Quotes

The first is that instead of writing a sequel, which is what most people do, this is in fact a prequel. Although we didn't know that when we began the process.

I feel for Veronica Mars so much when I'm watching at home. It is a wonderful story. The writing is consistently funny, biting, charming, heart-wrenching, etc. I also like the look of it. The cinematography - different from any other show.

The secret of writing comedy is to know where it's all going, then get ahead of it.

The writing process, the way I go about it is I do whatever the beat feels like, whatever the beat is telling me to do. Usually when the beat comes on, I think of a hook or the subject I want to rap about almost instantly. Within four, eight bars of it playing I'm just like, 'Oh, OK. This is what I wanna do'.

If I stopped writing and being at my piano, I wouldn't know how to live. It's your best friend.

I'll know when the ideas aren't fresh anymore. And I'll know when writing doesn't give me a thrill anymore.

I'd excluded New York from my writing, and then I came back and I fell in love with it all over again. The energy comes from an absence, that yearning for New York when you are not there.

The cookbooks and the writing in general have been a real bonus, but it's not something I've ever pursued... I've been lucky, I guess.

The reason I started writing movies was because I kept getting parts that I just kind of stepped into. I didn't have to do a lot of work and I ended up getting sort of bored.

I've been singing since I was two. Music was my first passion and I love writing, singing, creating and being creative.

I've made a career writing about fictitious anti-heroes. To create these worlds, I've spent a lot of time with active members on both sides of the law. And if I had to pick the most interesting of the two, the choice is obvious - we all love the guys in black.

My first semester, I got a D in creative writing.

I loved writing for kids, I loved talking to children about what I'd written, I don't want to leave that behind.

I was writing and I have three kids. I was occupying my time with them but it was difficult.

However, writing software without defects is not sufficient. In my experience, it is at least as difficult to write software that is safe - that is, software that behaves reasonably under adverse conditions.

The best thing that ever happened to me is that nothing happened in writing. I ended up working for engineering companies, and that's where I found my material, in the everyday struggle between capitalism and grace. Being broke and tired, you don't come home your best self.

That isn't writing at all, it's typing.

Breaking records is not something you expect to be doing. That's like a sports thing, it's not usually a comedy and writing thing.

No one likes to work for free. To copy an artist's work and download it free is stealing. It's hard work writing and recording music, and it's morally wrong to steal it.

The reason that I keep writing is that all my most powerful messages about the fates of wild places that I care about need to have words as well as images.

My writing comes not from the happy moments, but from struggle and grief.

If you're young enough, any kind of writing you do for a short period of time is a marvelous apprenticeship.

If you know what you are going to write when you're writing a poem, it's going to be average.

The essays are different because ultimately it's things I'm interested in, and I'm really just writing about myself and using those subjects as a prism.

The writing is really hard. You're alone. It really pulls it out of you. You pull it out of your head. But when you're a director, you're shopping - you're picking this actor, you're picking this scene. It's like the most intense kinetic high-speed shopping of all time. You sit in a chair and it will all come rushing at you like a wind tunnel.

Sometimes I eavesdrop on people. I could rationalize it - oh, this is good anthropological research for characters I'm writing - but it's basically just nosiness. It also helps me gauge where I'm at: Am I normal?

I don't think Capote loved Smith. But he did make a deep connection. It upset some people, because that had never been the approach to journalistic crime writing, to look into the mind of the killer.

Not only are Christians writing about Jesus, but also Communists, Jews, atheists and agnostics are taking up their pens to paint a portrait of Jesus.

I'm one of those writers who, when writing, believes she's god-and that she hasn't bestowed free will on any of her characters. In that sense there are no surprises in any of my books.

Well I've been writing books. So that, by its nature, is kind of a solitary occupation. And from time to time I have research help, but mostly I've done those completely on my own.