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Writer's pictureUntold Stories

20 inspirational quotes about writing

A series of quotes from brilliant authors to motivate and inspire your writing:


1. “If I waited for perfection, I would never write a word.” ~ Margaret Atwood

2. “You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write.” ~ Saul Bellow


3. “First, find out what your hero wants, then just follow him!” ~ Ray Bradbury


4. “Dreams never fade as long as you make them a reality.” ~ Steven Cuoco


Dream on

5. The work never matches the dream of perfection the artist has to start with. ~ William Faulkner


6. “The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words.” ~ William H. Gass


7. “The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.” ~ Thomas Jefferson


8. Description begins in the writer’s imagination but should finish in the reader’s.” ~ Stephen King


The power of imagination

9. “Don’t forget – no one else sees the world the way you do, so no one else can tell the stories that you have to tell.” ~ Charles de Lint


10. “I kept always two books in my pocket, one to read, one to write in.” ~ Robert Louis Stevenson


11. “A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.” ~ Thomas Mann


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


Keep writing


13. “We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.” ~ Anaïs Nin


14. “I write to discover what I know.” ~ Flannery O’Connor


15. “You can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page” ~ Jodi Picoult


16. “The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.” ~ Terry Pratchett


Write and don't look back


17. “Start before you’re ready.” ~ Steven Pressfield


18. “Words are a lens to focus one’s mind.” ~ Ayn Rand


19. “Words are our most inexhaustible source of magic.” ~ J. K. Rowling


20. “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


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