Colum McCann Quotes

Writers tell stories better, because they've had more practice, but everyone has a book in them. Yes, that old cliche.

Many novice writers, students in particular, think that writing is little more than copying down their self-talk, the palaver of the voices they hear in their heads. Of course, self-talk is thinking, and writing begins with thinking.

The only way to be a novelist, to think that you can create something others will give themselves up to for a dozen hours or more, is to have psychotic self-belief.

I never think that any writer can teach someone how to write.

It's probably true that everyone has a book in them, although it may not be a very good one.

Teaching writing over the years intrudes on your own writing in important ways, taking away some of the excitement of poetry.

I think people who create and write, it actually does flow-just flows from into their head, into their hand, and they write it down. It's simple.

Every journalist has a novel in him, which is an excellent place for it.

I decided to become an author when my grandmother taught me to write, when I was six. I can still recall the sensation of being able to turn words into stories. It was a miracle.

I don't have the fear I won't be able to think of something else to write. It's what I do.

I don't think I'm a brilliant writer, but I'm a good writer, and it's just so empowering to get involved.

Creative writing lessons can be very useful, just like music lessons can be useful. To say, as Hanif Kureishi did, that 99.9% of students are talentless is cruel and wrong. I believe that certain writers like to believe they arrived into the world with special, unteachable powers because it is good for the ego.

When you compose, it's like writing. You're like a writer. You just think all the time.

I write all the time and I try to think of ideas all the time.

Don't write about what you know - write about what you're interested in. Don't write about yourself - you aren't as interesting as you think.

I could write stories just as rotten.

The thing that inspires me most is reading and just observing the people around me. I think those are the two things that make me want to write.

I think a lot of the way that I try to write my stories come from watching my mom write plays and trying to do that.

I write about, more or less, everything I can think of, that is I stretch my imagination as far as it'll go. I am kind of stuck in the middle as far as my life goes, and hence my imagination tends to zero in on things which are indeed in the middle. That is, I don't write about the very rich, who I scarcely know, or the very poor who I don't know very well either.

I can't write. I would love to. I don't really have an interest in it, to be honest. I'll leave that to my fiance.

I wish I was one of those people who could write script after script and pages and pages. I can only aspire to do that.

Reading yields a wish to write, I think, except if the reading is dull and uninspiring.

On the whole, I think you should write biographies of those you admire and respect, and novels about human beings who you think are sadly mistaken.

I don't think you could teach someone to be a genius, but you can certainly teach them to not make rookie mistakes and to look at writing the way a writer looks at writing, and not just the way a reader looks at writing. There are a lot of techniques and skills that can be taught that will be helpful to anybody, no matter how gifted they are, and I think writing programs can be very good for people.

I still think that of all the people doing top fiction today, John D. MacDonald is the best.He was my model as a kid. If there are people out there that want to write, all you need to do is read 20 of his stories to get an idea what it takes to make a story kick over.