Story Was Crucial to Our Evolution

Story, as it turns out, was crucial to our evolution—more so than opposable thumbs. Opposable thumbs let us hang on; story told us what to hang on to.

LISA CRON

You Don't Try

You don't try. That's very important: not to try, either for Cadillacs, creation or immortality. You wait, and if nothing happens, you wait some more. It's like a bug high on the wall. You wait for it to come to you. When it gets close enough you reach out, slap out and kill it. Or if you like its looks, you make a pet out of it.

CHARLES BUKOWSKI

Your Mother Will Not Make You A Writer

Notice how many of the Olympic athletes effusively thanked their mothers for their success? “She drove me to my practice at four in the morning,” etc. Writing is not figure skating or skiing. Your mother will not make you a writer. My advice to any young person who wants to write is: leave home.

PAUL THEROUX

Imagine That You Are Dying

Imagine that you are dying. If you had a terminal disease would you finish this book? Why not? The thing that annoys this 10-weeks-to-live self is the thing that is wrong with the book. So change it. Stop arguing with yourself. Change it. See? Easy. And no one had to die.

ANNE ENRIGHT

What Makes A Good Story

What makes a good story is…I don’t know what makes a good story. I guess being totally immersed in the leading character and his or her quest and rooting relentlessly for that character to conquer all the terrible things all of us have to overcome to make any kind of a good life.

MEL BROOKS

Get Up Early and Write

If anybody has a job and starts at 9, there’s no reason why they can’t get up at 4:30 or five and write for a couple of hours, and give their employers their second-best effort of the day—which is what I did.

MARY OLIVER

Editors Make Mistakes

Editors make mistakes. By actual count, 121 publishers said “No thanks” to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Roger Tory Peterson’s Field Guide to the Birds and Lolita were turned down too, again and again. The Clan of the Cave Bear, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, The Peter Principle, Watership Down, To Kill A Mockingbird—rejected, every one.

JUDITH APPLEBAUM

Sneaking Up On It Sometimes Helps

Sneaking up on it sometimes helps: I’ve found I can be very productive for an hour before dinner, because there obviously isn’t enough time to really do anything, so I can tell myself I’m just screwing around.

MICHAEL CRICHTON

The Hardest Part

Before I write the lead of a piece, I think the hardest part is how to begin. Then, once I have that done, I think the hardest part is the section that comes right after the lead. Then, of course, the ending. In other words, it's all hard, just sequentially.

SUSAN ORLEAN

We Go With Our Characters Wherever They Lead Us

Trollope said, “On the last day of each month recorded, every person in a work of fiction should be a month older than on the first.” We go with our characters wherever they lead us, and as time makes its mark on us, so it must on them.

HALLIE BURNETT