Writer Quotes

I used to object to being called an Indian writer, and would always say I was a writer who happened to be an Indian, and who happened to write about Indians.

My assignment is what every writer's assignment is: tell the truth of his own time.

A novel's whole pattern is rarely apparent at the outset of writing, or even at the end; that is when the writer finds out what a novel is about, and the job becomes one of understanding and deepening or sharpening what is already written. That is finding the theme.

Every writer has to figure out what works best - and often has to select and discard different tools before they find the one that fits.

To begin impatiently is the worst mistake a writer can make.

The number one secret of being a successful writer is this: marry an English major.

I am, really, a great writer; my only difficulty is in finding great readers.

Disney was not a good animator, he didn't draw well at all, but he was always a great idea man, and a good writer.

I am an artist and have no right buggering about with verbs and split infinitives, which is what being a writer says to me.

It's very hard to be a gentleman and a writer.

This is terrible, when a writer is bored by his own work, but it was a real bomb and had reached the point where I couldn't even stand to look at it any more.

I can count all the ways in which being a mother has enriched my understanding of the world, of character, my sense of the future and my attachment to it. I can't imagine what kind of writer I'd be if I didn't have my kids.

As a writer, I'm more interested in what people tell themselves happened rather than what actually happened.

Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin. The talent of a writer is his ability to give them their separate names, identities, personalities and have them relate to other characters living with him.

I like L.A. It's like a mini break. For a writer, it's hilarious. Like the food. Where I come from, we eat chip sandwiches: white bread, butter, tomato catsup and big fat french fries. It's delicious. Here, you order a creme caramel and the waiter says, 'You know, that contains dairy.'

I had a little epiphany when I was a writer at 'Chicago' magazine. I sat down to dinner at the Ritz-Carlton. Somebody poured a white dessert wine with chocolate cake. It was a wine I would never have expected to make sense. The idea of any wine tasting fabulous with chocolate cake was fascinating to me.

For a writer, life is always too short to write. I will just try my best during what remains of my life.

I've been accused of being unambitious, but what I do takes up every minute. I'm executive producer, I'm a writer and the host.

I always serve the writer first because I'm English trained, even though I'm American.

I can't predict how reading habits will change. But I will say that the greatest loss is the paper archive - no more a great stack of manuscripts, letters, and notebooks from a writer's life, but only a tiny pile of disks, little plastic cookies where once were calligraphic marvels.

The career of a writer is comparable to that of a woman of easy virtue. You write first for pleasure, later for the pleasure of others and finally for money.

I love movies. Movies have influenced me as a writer.

From the moment I wrote 'Leaf Storm' I realized I wanted to be a writer and that nobody could stop me and that the only thing left for me to do was to try to be the best writer in the world.

When I did the first 'Matrix,' after it came out, I had a woman come up to me and just thank me for Trinity because she was an action writer. She said she was getting really good opportunities now.

My idea is always to reach my generation. The wise writer writes for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmasters of ever afterward.

Being a writer in a library is rather like being a eunuch in a harem.

I don't think of myself as a director or writer. I think of myself as a filmmaker.

But I work harder now because I have so much more exposure. And actually the harder you work as a writer, the better you get at it. It's like anything else. It's a muscle you have to exercise. I write more now than ever.

I certainly derived my skills as a prose writer from my scrutiny of poetry and of the individual word. But schools don't do things like that anymore - tracking words down to their roots.

The reason a writer writes a book is to forget a book and the reason a reader reads one is to remember it.