A Dozen Reasons to Write

Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia. ~E.L. Doctorow

And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt. ~Sylvia Plath

Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable. ~Francis Bacon

Writing comes more easily if you have something to say. ~Sholem Asch

Writing is utter solitude, the descent into the cold abyss of oneself. ~Franz Kafka

The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies. ~Ray Bradbury

The good writing of any age has always been the product of someone's neurosis, and we'd have a mighty dull literature if all the writers that came along were a bunch of happy chuckleheads. ~William Styron, interview, Writers at Work, 1958

I do not like to write - I like to have written. ~Gloria Steinem

Writing is a product of silence. ~Carrie Latet

Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will. ~Goethe

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author. ~G.K. Chesterton

There is no royal path to good writing; and such paths as do exist do not lead through neat critical gardens, various as they are, but through the jungles of self, the world, and of craft. ~Jessamyn West, Saturday Review, 21 September 1957