"Get black on white." ~ Guy de Maupassant
Fiction is based on reality unless you’re a fairytale artist. ~ Hunter S. Thompson
As to the adjective: when in doubt, strike it out. ~ Mark Twain
The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it. ~ Samuel Johnson
My task which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word to make you hear, make you feel--it is, before all, to make you see. That--and no more, and it is everything. ~ Joseph Conrad
To live, to err, to fall, to triumph, to recreate life out of life!… On and on and on and on! ~ James Joyce
Writing is simply the writer and the reader on opposite ends of a pencil; they should be as close together as that. ~ Jay R. Gould
Life can't ever really defeat a writer who is in love with writing, for life itself is a writer's lover until death--fascinating, cruel, lavish, warm, cold, treacherous, constant. ~ Edna Ferber
Don't verb nouns. Never, ever use repetitive redundancies. Last but not least, avoid cliches like the plague. ~ William Safire
Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart. ~ William Wadsworth
When you use words, you're able to keep your mind alive. Writing is my way of reaffirming my own existence. ~ Gao Xingjian
Writing is a delicious agony. ~ Gwendolyn Brooks