#writing

You’ve got to lick yourself into shape. Nobody can do it for you. The man who dreams of artistry, and yet thinks it is necessary for somebody else to lick him into shape, is a man whose art is doomed to be mediocre. Please believe me, this is not harshness on my part: it is the harshness of the nature of the game that I am exposing to you. If you are going to deliver the real goods, you’ve got to do your own licking into shape. ↗

— Jack London

#mentorship #writing #art

Arranging a bowl of flowers in the morning can give a sense of quiet in a crowded day - like writing a poem or saying a prayer. ↗

— Anne Morrow Lindbergh

#arranging #bowl #crowded #day #flowers

The basic drive behind real philosophy is curiosity about the world, not interest in the writings of philosophers. ↗

— Bryan Magee

#basic #behind #curiosity #drive #interest

Being a librarian certainly helped me with my writing because it made me even more of a reader, and I was always an enthusiastic reader. Writing and reading seem to me to be different aspects of a single imaginative act. ↗

— Margaret Mahy

#always #aspects #be different #because #being

I discovered in writing the biography of Bill Clinton that it is actually easier to write a biography of someone who is dead. Although you can't interview them, you have a fuller perspective on their whole life after they're gone and people are more willing to talk about them. ↗

— David Maraniss

#actually #after #although #bill #bill clinton

There's no better satisfaction than writing. I feel that writing is the best and everything else comes with it. ↗

— Garry Marshall

#better #comes #else #everything #feel

Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days. ↗

— Flannery O'Connor

#childhood #humor #southern-authors #southern-writers #writing

The vehemence with which certain critics have chosen not simply to criticize what I've written, but to challenge my writing this story at all, speaks of what the book is about: fear of disapproval. ↗

— Joyce Maynard

#book #certain #challenge #chosen #criticize

The outstanding people realized that the job involved more than just writing a good strategic plan. It was also important that top management should understand the plan and be prepared to adopt it. ↗

— David C. McClelland

#also #be prepared #good #important #involved

The truest art I would strive for in any work would be to give the page the same qualities as earth: weather would land on it harshly; light would elucidate the most difficult truths; wind would sweep away obtuse padding. ↗

— Gretel Ehrlich

#nature #writing #art