THE ABC’S OF WRITING: THE SECRETS TO SUCCESS

A

You know how it is in the kid’s book world; it’s just bunny eat bunny.

- Anonymous

B

He was such a bad writer, they revoked his poetic license.

- Milton Berle

C

“The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has got to make sense.”

– Tom Clancy

D

Never throw up on an editor.

- Ellen Datlow

E

“You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.”

- Madeleine L’Engle

F

“The pen is mightier than the sword, and considerably easier to write with.”

– Marty Feldman

G

When writing a novel, that’s pretty much entirely what life turns into: ‘House burned down. Car stolen. Cat exploded. Did 1500 easy words, so all in all it was a pretty good day.’

- Neil Gaiman

H

“I write one page of masterpiece to ninety-one pages of shit. I try to put the shit in the wastebasket.”

- Ernest Hemingway

I

“If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn’t brood. I’d type a little

faster.”

- Isaac Asimov

J

I went for years not finishing anything. Because, of course, when you finish something you can be judged…I had poems which were re-written so many times I suspect it was just a way of avoiding sending them out.

- Erica Jong

K

“His Majesty the King requires that the Royal Chancellery in all written documents endeavor to write in clear, plain Swedish.”

– King Charles XII of Sweden (1682-1718)

L

Writing is a fairly lonely business unless you invite people in to watch you do it, which is often distracting and then you have to ask them to leave.

- Marc Lawrence

M

“Writing well means never having to say, ‘I guess you had to be there.’”

– Jeff Mallett

N

The reader has certain rights. He bought your story. Think of this as an implicit contract. He’s entitled to be entertained, instructed, amused; maybe all three. If he quits in the middle, or puts the book down feeling his time has been wasted, you’re in violation.

- Larry Niven

O

“I have been correcting the proofs of my poems. In the morning, after hard work, I took a comma out of one sentence…. In the afternoon I put it back again.”

– Oscar Wilde

P

“The letter I have written today is longer than usual because I lacked the time to make it shorter.”

– Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

Q

Write quickly and you will never write well; write well, and you will soon write quickly.

- Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, circa 65 A.D.

R

Fundamentally, all writing is about the same thing; it’s about dying, about the brief flicker of time we have here, and the frustration that it creates.

- Mordecai Richler

S

“I am the King of Rome, and above grammar.”

– Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)

T

Fiction writing is great. You can make up almost anything.

- Ivana Trump, upon finishing her first novel

U

Inside every fat book is a thin book trying to get out.

- Unknown

V

“I write when I’m inspired, and I see to it that I’m inspired at nine o’clock every morning.”

– Peter De Vries (1910-1993)

W

“From now on, ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I shall not put.”

– Winston Churchill

X

For me, writing was a question of survival…I could not trust anyone, even my family. The atmosphere was so poisoned. People even in your own family could turn you in.

- Gao Xingjian, who wrote during the Cultural Revolution of Mao Tse-Tung

Y

Neither Christ nor Buddha nor Socrates wrote a book, for to do so is to exchange life for a logical process.

- William Butler Yeats

Z

“The pencil is mightier than the pen.”

- Zen and the Art of Motorcyle Maintenance (Robert Pirsig)

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