There Is No Royal Path to Good Writing

There is no royal path to good writing, and such paths as do exist do not lead through neat critical gardens, but through the jungles of self, the world, and of craft.

JESSAMYN WEST

Articulate from the Specific

Every writer must articulate from the specific. They must reach down where they stand, because there is nothing else from which to draw.

GLORIA NAYLOR

There Is No Right Way Or Wrong Way

No one can teach you exactly how to write. Each person approaches creative writing differently. Every writer has his or her own method. I usually have a character or story idea inside my head for a long time (sometimes years) before I actually begin. I know where I'm starting and where I'm going but I never know what's going to happen in the middle or if the ending will be what I imagined on the day I began to write. It's the surprise that makes writing exciting for me. Other writers know everything before they begin. They make detailed outlines or have it all worked out in their heads before they put a word on paper. There is no right way or wrong way. There are a hundred different ways to tell the same story. Whatever works for you is okay.

JUDY BLUME

Writing Is A Voyage of Discovery

Writing, like life itself, is a voyage of discovery. The adventure is a metaphysical one; it is a way of approaching life indirectly, of acquiring a total rather than a partial view of the universe. The writer lives between the upper and lower worlds: he takes the path in order eventually to become that path himself.

HENRY MILLER

The Difference Between Fact and Fiction

The world that fiction comes from is fragile. It melts into insignificance against the universe of what is clear and visible and known. It persists because it is based on the power of cadence and rhythm in language and these are mysterious and hard to defeat and keep in their place. The difference between fact and fiction is like the difference between land and water.

COLM TÓIBÍN

High Concept is the Enemy of the Writer

High concept is the enemy of the writer. The friend of the writer is the human being, the full-blooded character interacting with another character.

JOSEPH L. MANKIEWICZ

Write What You Really Think

Write what you really think and mean, not what you think you should think and not what you thought you would think and not what you hope it will mean, but what is really authentic and true.

SUSAN ORLEAN

Smarten Up Your Protagonist

Your protagonist is your reader’s portal into the story. The more observant he or she can be, the more vivid will be the world you’re creating. They don’t have to be super-educated, they just have to be mentally active. Keep them looking, thinking, wondering, remembering.

JANET FITCH

Rejection

To be a writer is to embrace rejection as a way of life.

DANA STABENOW

Failure is part of it. You will be rejected dozens and dozens of times. The best way to prepare for it is to have something else in the works by the time the rejection letter arrives. Invest your hope in the next project. Learning to cope with rejection is a good trait to develop.

PO BRONSON

You have to know how to accept rejection and reject acceptance.

RAY BRADBURY

This manuscript of yours that has just come back from another editor is a precious package. Don’t consider it rejected. Consider that you’ve addressed it “to the editor who can appreciate my work” and it has simply come back stamped “Not at this address.” Just keep looking for the right address.

BARBARA KINGSOLVER

I love my rejection slips. They show me I try.

SYLVIA PLATH

I discovered that rejections are not altogether a bad thing. They teach a writer to rely on his own judgment and to say in his heart of hearts, “To hell with you.”

SAUL BELLOW

Work like hell! I had 122 rejection slips before I sold a story.

F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

Every rejection is incremental payment on your dues that in some way will be translated back into your work.

JAMES LEE BURKE

Rejection slips, or form letters, however tactfully phrased, are lacerations of the soul, if not quite inventions of the devil — but there is no way around them.

ISAAC ASIMOV

The great American novel has not only already been written, it has already been rejected.

SOMERSET MAUGHAM

Close the Door

Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don't try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It's the one and only thing you have to offer.

BARBARA KINGSOLVER