Writer Quotes

I am a writer of the textbooks of scientology.

I turned down twelve films last year... Huge money films, but I had no respect for the writer or the work.

That, for me, is a very important test of a young writer's commitment because most of them are going to have to continue doing that when they've finished the program.

When writing a novel a writer should create living people; people not characters. A character is a caricature.

The acting is something that will always be a part of my life, but the writing gives me a lot more creative freedom. You're a pawn in somebody else's chess game, whereas as a writer and as a director, you get to call the shots. And that's very thrilling.

Kafka is still unrecognized. He thought he was a comic writer.

I wanted to use what I was, to be what I was born to be - not to have a 'career', but to be that straightforward obvious unmistakable animal, a writer.

A literary journal is intended to connect writer with reader; the role of the editor is to mediate.

I'm a writer, and what I do is write. I wasn't able to do anything else.

I have several writer friends, but I don't involve them in my work process. I'm more likely to talk about the business of publishing with them.

Any writer worth the name is always getting into one thing or getting out of another thing.

A workshop is a way of renting an audience, and making sure you're communicating what you think you're communicating. It's so easy as a young writer to think you're been very clear when in fact you haven't.

Success comes to a writer as a rule, so gradually that it is always something of a shock to him to look back and realize the heights to which he has climbed.

The writer of prose can only step aside when the poet passes.

I wanted to do - there was this film called 'Magic' that Anthony Hopkins did. And the director wanted me. The writer wanted me. Joe Levine said no, I don't want any comedians in this.

What a writer can do, what a fiction writer or a poet or an essay writer can do is re-engage people with their own humanity.

I am a writer who came of a sheltered life. A sheltered life can be a daring life as well. For all serious daring starts from within.

A professional writer is an amateur who didn't quit.

You don't say, I'm going to be a writer when I grow up - at least I didn't.

I am a comic writer, which means I get to slay the dragons, and shoot the bull.

I had a very happy childhood, which is unsuitable if you're going to be an Irish writer.

Without the faintest possibility of finding a job, I decided to devote myself to literature: it was about time to find out what I was worth as a writer.

For a writer, published works are like fallen flowers, but the expected new work is like a calyx waiting to blossom.

Perhaps it would be better not to be a writer, but if you must, then write.

I think there's a time as a writer when you want to see the best things in life, and you go out wherever you go with your dreams as a writer or a composer.

I had never thought of myself as a director and found out that I was not. I am a writer who was able to direct the films that I write.

I'm fairly competant as a director and actor, but I am Mr. Neurotic as a writer. I just don't have enough confidence in my abilities to take criticism well. I take it personally. Start with 'It's a masterpiece,' and then tell me what you think could be changed.

No writer should minimize the factor that affects everyone, but is beyond control: luck.

In journalism just one fact that is false prejudices the entire work. In contrast, in fiction one single fact that is true gives legitimacy to the entire work. That's the only difference, and it lies in the commitment of the writer. A novelist can do anything he wants so long as he makes people believe in it.

Every writer I know has trouble writing.