Quotes on editing, editors, writing, writers . . .

[_Lynn_]

Quotes can be inspiring, interesting, and even funny. Some go back centuries. Others are more recent. From H.L. Mencken to Mark Twain, Gloria Steinem to Steve Martin, their words are famous.


The first draft of anything is shit. ~ Ernest Hemingway

 

[Dream_Operator]

One of my favorite Christopher Moore quotes on writing:

Write in scenes, just like in play or a movie. Each scene should accomplish something. (Making people laugh is also accomplishing something, although you won't find that in any of the "how to write" books) This will further break up your chapters.

Best thing to do with a scene is use guerilla tactics. That is: get in, get out, and nobody gets hurt. If you must describe, describe in order of perception. You notice that a person in the bar is wearing a chicken suit long before you notice that the bar has leaded glass mirrors.

 

[_Lynn_]

Substitute damn every time you’re inclined to write very; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. ~~ Mark Twain

 

[LadyCibelle]

"A writer is unfair to himself when he is unable to be hard on himself." -- Marianne Moore

 

[game_master24]

“If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.”
― Toni Morrison

 

[LadyCibelle]

"I suppose some editors are failed writers; but so are most writers." - T. S. Eliot

 

[_Lynn_]

Perhaps an editor might begin a reformation in some such way as this. Divide his paper into 4 chapters, heading the 1st, Truths, 2nd, Probabilities, 3rd, Possibilities, 4th, Lies.

~~ Thomas Jefferson (Letter to John Norvell, June 14, 1807)

 

[PennLady]

“If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.”
― Toni Morrison

This is very similar to what my prof for a Sci Fi class said. If you don't like the story, write the one you want.

 

[sr71plt]

Perhaps an editor might begin a reformation in some such way as this. Divide his paper into 4 chapters, heading the 1st, Truths, 2nd, Probabilities, 3rd, Possibilities, 4th, Lies.

~~ Thomas Jefferson (Letter to John Norvell, June 14, 1807)

This is an entirely different sort of editor, though. Jefferson was criticizing muckraking newspaper editors (which, unfortunately, he had a great responsibility for creating in the first place), not copyeditors.

 

[_Lynn_]

This is an entirely different sort of editor, though. Jefferson was criticizing muckraking newspaper editors (which, unfortunately, he had a great responsibility for creating in the first place), not copyeditors.

Very true.

 

[oggbashan]

Cyril Connolly:

1. A great writer creates a world of his own and his readers are proud to live in it. A lesser writer may entice them in for a moment, but soon he will watch them filing out.

2. Literature is the art of writing something that will be read twice; journalism what will be grasped at once.

3. Better to write for yourself and have no public, than write for the public and have no self.

 

[PennLady]

Lots of quotes on editors here.

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/editors.html

 

[_Lynn_]

I'll post one on writing for PL.


Writing should be the settlement of dew on the leaf. ~~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (Journal, 1845)

 

[PennLady]

I'll post one on writing for PL.

Writing should be the settlement of dew on the leaf. ~~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (Journal, 1845)

Thanks.

And I'm such a geek that my mind leaps to Serenity, when Wash says: "I am a leaf on the wind, watch me soar." And then... better left unsaid.

But I like yours better for writing!

 

[elfin_odalisque]

"In art economy is always beauty."

T.S.Eliot


"Remember the waterfront shack with the sign FRESH FISH SOLD HERE. Of course it's fresh, we're on the ocean. Of course it's for sale, we're not giving it away. Of course it's here, otherwise the sign would be someplace else.
The final sign, FISH."

Peggy Noonan

Makes me smile.

 

[Bramblethorn]

"I'm your fucking muse, you little polyp."
"No no! My muse is willowy! Alabaster!"
"Yeah, she had an accident. I'm your muse now."

http://www.oglaf.com/blank-page/
http://www.oglaf.com/muse/

 

[_Lynn_]

Began another boy’s book—more to be at work than anything else. I have written 400 pages on it—therefore it is very nearly half done. It is Huck Finn’s Autobiography. I like it only tolerably well, as far as I have got, and may possibly pigeonhole or burn the MS when it is done.

Mark Twain ~~ Letter to William Dean Howells, August 9, 1876. Twain was referring to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, published in 1884.

 

[oggbashan]

Chekhov

A writer must be as objective as a chemist: he must abandon the subjective line; he must know that dung-heaps play a very reasonable part in a landscape, and that evil passions are as inherent in life as good ones.


Brevity is the sister of talent.

If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired. Otherwise don't put it there.

Anton Chekhov

 

[oggbashan]

Translation?

Ce qui n'est pas clair n'est pas français.

What is not clear is not French - (or English, or American)

Antoine de Rivarol

For those who have tasted the profound activity of writing, reading is no more than a secondary pleasure.

A novel is a mirror which passes over a highway. Sometimes it reflects to your eyes the blue of the skies, at others the churned-up mud of the road.

I know of only one rule: style cannot be too clear, too simple.

Stendhal

 

[oggbashan]

All books are divisible into two classes, the books of the hour, and the books of all time.

Better the rudest work that tells a story or records a fact, than the richest without meaning.

John Ruskin

 

[AsylumSeeker]

Like oil and water, at Thanksgiving dinner, politics and religion are not the best subjects to broach. Or so he wrote and signed on the back of one.

I'll credit the famous Sarurday Evening Post artist Norman Rockwell, and still wished I owned that print. Might be worth more now.

I let it go for $900. But since I bought it for $400 it seemed like a deal at the time.

Who knows the real value now.

 

[_Lynn_]

The best writing has no lace on its sleeves.

~~ Walt Whitman (Remark to the author, June 23, 1888. In Horace Traubel, Walt Whitman's Camden Conversations)

 

[AsylumSeeker]

The best writing has no lace on its sleeves.

~~ Walt Whitman (Remark to the author, June 23, 1888. In Horace Traubel, Walt Whitman's Camden Conversations)

I have asked Laurel to cancel my account because I know I don't belong here. I offer no assistance but only controversy.

And if she's content to allow me to do so, then so be it. I've done what I can. But if she doesn't then here I shall remain with her desire.

I think she feels her mods are out of control and and wishes to reign them in.

Don't know. It's a theory.

 

[_Lynn_]

The original writer is not one who imitates nobody, but one whom nobody can imitate.

~~ Chateaubriand (Le Genie du Christianisme, 1802)

 

[AsylumSeeker]

The original writer is not one who imitates nobody, but one whom nobody can imitate.

~~ Chateaubriand (Le Genie du Christianisme, 1802)

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