“ Theoretically there's no reason one should get [writer's block], if one understands that writing, after all, is only writing, neither something one ought to feel deeply guilty about nor something one… John Gardner
“ Turn your thoughts to novel writing—narrative, let it be about what it will, is read, because the mind quietly acquiesces, and it requires no trouble to think about it. On your part it will demand muc… Charlotte Turner Smith
“ I'll call any length of fiction a story, whether it be a novel or a shorter piece, and I'll call anything a story in which specific characters and events influence each other to form a meaningful narr… Flannery O'Connor
“ As a general rule, I surmise that most fictional stories are populated by misfits, changelings, and oddities, which is what makes the writing interesting and considered novel. Todd Crawshaw
“ Novel-writing has in one respect an affinity to the drama—that time and distance are required to soften for use the harsher features that may be exhibited from real life; that it was almost impossible… Charlotte Turner Smith
“ Rich will be my life if I can keep my memories full and brimming, and record them on clear-eyed mornings while I set joyously to work setting pen to holy craft. Roman Payne
“ A new novel awaits my arrival, prepares for my careful inspection. Yet a novel is always a long dream that lives in me for years before I know where to go to hunt it out. Pat Conroy
“ You could use a moth like that as a symbol in a novel, but it was trite, wasn’t it? The old moth-to-the-flame image had been used and used again. It was the stuff of amateur poetry. And she, having so… L.L. Barkat
“ One Bagatelle, and I’ll raise you a novel,” Megan had tweeted back.“Writing for tea? Now that would have been a solution for the British empire,” Laura returned.“Writing for me,” Megan had typed.“I’ll… L.L. Barkat
“ She meant you have to live a story for a time.''And?''And then you can write it, in time. What have you lived?''Kind of a personal question for Twitterland.''Kind of the perfect question to answer in… L.L. Barkat
“ Maybe you didn’t need to know anything special to write a work of fiction. Maybe you didn’t need to delve into some kind of life question you knew you’d lived. Perhaps your subconscious would do the j… L.L. Barkat
“ If she was going to write a novel, she felt defeated before she began, because someone might be coming along to pick it apart, looking for symbols like The Conch or The Whale, which seemed to have myt… L.L. Barkat
“ The very qualities that make one a writer in the first place contribute to the block: hypersensitivity, stubbornness, insatiability, and so on. Given the general oddity of writers, no wonder there are… John Gardner
“ Throughout my career I’ve lived in constant fear that I wouldn’t be good enough, that I’d have nothing to say, that I’d be laughed at, humiliated—and I’m old enough to know that fear will follow me to… Pat Conroy
“ One thing an early-on writer has to learn, is to be comfortable with and responsive to critique. When five people in a group tell you this chapter sucks; don’t snap back at them with, “Sure, but it ge… Edward Fahey
