Robert Gottlieb Quotes

Writing is hard.

I have to always remember, writing is really hard.

Writing is hard - writing is the hardest.

Little do such men know the toil, the pains, the daily, nightly racking of the brains, to range the thoughts, the matter to digest, to cull fit phrases, and reject the rest.

I write my columns pretty carefully.

Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.

Writing is always harder than talking.

Oh how I wish I could be as obsessive as Carrie from 'Homeland' when I'm writing a book! That would save me a lot of trouble during the revision process.

I don't think music affects what words I choose to type in what order, within what punctuation, at this point, because I'm rereading and editing each sentence, at this point, in my published books, probably 100-150 times each, on average, and listening to probably 20-60 different songs in that time.

Writing is hard. I mean, I sit there and work at it.

Reading taught me how to write.

I can always write. Sometimes, to be sure, what I write is crap, but it's words on the page and therefore it is something to work with.

Writing is immensely difficult. The short forms especially.

You don't write because you want to say something, you write because you have something to say.

I write the paragraph, then I'm crossing out, changing words, trying to improve it. When it seems more or less OK, then I type it up because sometimes it's almost illegible, and if I wait, I might not be able to read it the next day.

It's amazing, if you know what you want to say, how fast it is to write.

I continue to wish that writing were easier, that it would flow out completely perfect with no need for revisions.

I write by hand, making many, many corrections. I would say I cross out more than I write. I have to hunt for words when I speak, and I have the same difficulty when writing.

I think the best advice I give is to try not to write. Try not to overwrite, try not to make it sound too good. Just use your own voice. Use your own style of putting it down.

Writing is just very difficult. I'm an adequate performer. And I think I have a special talent as an editor. Editing is what I do best.

It's not hard to write poorly. But to write something good, it has to be revised.

I have a hard time revising sentences, because I spend an inordinate amount of time on each sentence, and the sentence before it, and the sentence after it.

Every published writer suffers through that first draft because most of the time, that's a disappointment.

I think with one exception I've never changed an opening sentence after a book was completed.

A novelist can never be his own reader, except when he is ridding his manuscript of syntax errors, repetitions, or the occasional superfluous paragraph.