Quotes On Writing - A Collection of Famous Writers

F. Scott Fitzgerald

"You don't write because you want to say something, you write because you have something to say."

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"Writers aren't exactly people... They're a whole bunch of people trying to be one person."  

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"That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings. That you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong."

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"Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat."

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"Genius is the ability to put into effect what is on your mind."

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"You can stroke people with words."

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"An author ought to write for the youth of his generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmaster of ever afterwards."

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"The world only exists in your eyes. You can make it as big or as small as you want."

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"You've got to sell your heart."

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"Show me a hero and I'll write you a tragedy."

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"All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath."

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"Action is character."

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"Vitality shows in not only the ability to persist but the ability to start over."

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"An artist is someone who can hold two opposing viewpoints and still remain functional."

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"Great books write themselves, only bad books have to be written."

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"Nothing is beneath you if it is in the direction of your life."

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"What people are ashamed of usually makes a good story."

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"Our lives are defined by opportunities, even the ones we miss."

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"Cut out all these exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke."

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"I don't want to repeat my innocence. I want the pleasure of losing it again."

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"If I knew words enough, I could write the longest love letter in the world and never get tired."

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"Often I think writing is a sheer paring away of oneself leaving always something thinner, barer, more meagre."

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"I shall go on shining as a brilliantly meaningless figure in a meaningless world."

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"If you are strong enough, there are no precedents."

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"There I was, way off my ambitions, getting deeper in love every minute."

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"Too much of anything is bad, but too much Champagne is just right."

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"When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen."

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"To write it, it took three months; to conceive it, three minutes; to collect the data in it, all my life."

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"Nobody ever became a writer just by wanting to be one."

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"I hope that you live a life you are proud of. If you find that you're not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again."

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