Stephen King Quotes

I always start out with an idea, even a boring idea, that becomes a question I don't have answers to.

a novel is not born of a single idea. The stories I've tried to write from one idea, no matter how terrific an idea, have sputtered out and died by chapter three. For me, novels have invariably come from a complex of ideas that in the beginning seemed to bear no relation to each other, but in the unconscious began mysteriously to merge and grow. Ideas for a novel are like the strong guy lines of a spider web. Without them the silken web cannot be spun.

I think that perhaps if I had had to slow down the ideas so that I could capture them on paper I might have stifled some of them.

To develop the creative attitude, analyze and focus on the wanted SOLUTION; seek out and fill your mind with the FACTS; write down ideas, both sensible and seemingly wild; let the facts and ideas simmer in your mind; evaluate, recheck, settle on the creative ideas.

It's rare you get an idea from a dream. I can't really recall a story that ever worked out that way. I think in 35 years of writing, that I've ever had a dream that held up. They're much too dislocated

When I journal, I write about images that I've seen that I think might make good stories. I write about things that I hear that I think I can turn into a story. I write about the story that I'm working on and where I think it might go.

The whole process of writing a novel is having this great, beautiful idea and then spoiling it.

I'm often asked, 'Where do you get your ideas?' ...It's like asking, 'Where do you find air to breathe?' Ideas are all around you.

If I come across an issue, or something I feel strongly about, and I happen to think of a song that would go in that direction, then I do it. But that's not what I start out, necessarily, to do. Sometimes I may have an idea for a song - "Well, I'm going to write about a thing.

I think every writer's had the experience of having a really good idea, waiting to write it, and then once you write it, you're like, "Oh I kind of got past the sell by date on this." I'm not connected to the initial spark that was the idea. A lot of that's about staying open.

When you get an idea, go and write. Don't waste it in conversation.

Writing has got to be an act of discovery....I write to find out what I'm thinking about.

I have time to write 1-2 novels per year, and get roughly novel-sized ideas every month. I have to perform triage on my own writing impulses.

I write nearly every day. Some days I write for ten or eleven hours. Other days I might only write for three hours. It really depends on how fast the ideas are coming.

Ideas are cheap. I have more ideas now than I could ever write up. To my mind, it's the execution that is all-important.

Before I start writing, before I have an idea of where and when the story happens, I research it thoroughly.

Sometimes it takes a germ of an idea, which takes a long time to digest.

The ideas for stories that thronged my brain would not let me rest till I had got rid of them by writing them.

It varies, I don't think there is any one set way of writing songs or coming up with ideas, it comes in so many ways you know.

Yes, I get dry spells. Sometimes I can't turn out a thing for three months. When one of those spells comes on I quit trying to work and go out and see something of life. You can't write a story that's got any life in it by sitting at a writing table and thinking. You've got to get out into the streets, into the crowds, talk with people, and feel the rush and throb of real life-that's the stimulant for a story writer.

It's not the ink, it's the think.

Writin songs is like a mystery. The most difficult thing to do is have a good idea. If you have a decent idea, the songs are the easy part. Actually having something to say is the hard part. If you get an idea for a song, then it pulls you along. There are just some ideas that you get that are really hard to edit out; it's hard to stop thinking about some bad ideas. So you just finish it and you end up putting it on a record.

...remember the dangers of the New Groupthink. If it's creativity you're after, ask your employees to solve problems alone before sharing their ideas. If you want the wisdom of the crowd, gather it electronically, or in writing, and make sure people can't see each other's ideas until everyone has had a chance to contribute.

Directing, to me, starts even before we get to the set. Directing is a fluid, an abstract thing. It's not done only purely in the moment. It's an idea that you plant before. It's a location that you show. It's something I whisper in someone's ear. It's a freeform thing. It only takes me a week to write the script, but it's years that you're thinking about it. The execution is really the fast part.

I think it's important to just be in your subconscious mind - at least when you're starting an idea.