Paula Fox Quotes

I can still put down some pretty nasty stuff on paper, which is what I enjoy doing.

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

Sean's a great, great writer.

I am not a trained writer.

There are seldom more than a couple of students in any workshop who seem natural writers.

Good writing of course requires talent, and no one can teach you to have talent.

There's many times this year I've sat back and thought, I'm making a living from making things up. It's the only skill I have so I've been really lucky.

No, you're either born a writer, a storyteller, or you're not.

Writers - all writers, even screenwriters - like to make their mark. I don't think many screenwriters can write. They pass as writers.

All this is rather pretentious and fey to even talk about, but Flannery O'Connor sat down to write stories. The rest of us, some of us, don't have that kind of wit and genius. We don't do that. We sit down and have some accidents.

I wasn't that great a chef, and I don't think I'm that great a writer.

A person who can write a long letter with ease, cannot write ill.

The writer can choose what he writes about but he cannot choose what he is able to make live.

Early on, it's good to develop the ability to write. Learning to write is a useful exercise, even if what you're writing about is not that relevant.

There are plenty of clever young writers. But there is too much genius, not enough talent.

There are two kinds of writers; the great ones who can give you truths, and the lessor ones, who can only give you themselves.

We like to think about how smart we are. But I think talent as a writer is hard-wired in, it's all there, at least the basic elements of it. You can't change it any more than you can choose whether to be right handed or left handed.

Just because someone has stylistic limitations doesn't necessarily make them a worse writer.

English of course is your major tool, but it is not nearly so important as other aspects of writing for example you have to have some natural ability you can't buy it no one puts it there you're born with it.

While I wasn't very good at much else in school, in my creative-writing classes or when we had to do some writing in my English classes, I tended to do better at it.

I never had a highfalutin' view of what I write.

I'm drawn to writers with skill sets I don't have.

When I was younger, I would write a ton, mostly because my mom told me I had incredible creativity and a gift of using words, only these were words that didn't get me in trouble.

Writing is the only thing I am good for.

Good writing comes from good talent.