Grace Paley Quotes

Writing is very good for household tasks. Because you'd rather fix a dripping tap or paint an old wall - you'd rather do almost anything than sit and write. I have to reach a point of obsession in order to write, and so I find starting a book incredibly difficult.

I had been attempting novels since I was 14 but always ran out of steam. High hopes, poor craftsmanship.

It is easy to have a lot of paintings or projects hanging around that are 'almost done.'

I got so I simply gagged everytime I sat before my desk to write an ad.

I was writing fiction, but not finishing fiction.

In a way, I started 'Goon Squad' not even realizing I was writing a book. I thought I was just writing a few stories to stall before starting this other book that I wanted to write - or thought I wanted to write: I still haven't written it.

The thing that was most harmful was that there was always something that was about to happen. So I found myself indulging in the writer's luxury of doing another draft, another idea. If this project isn't happening, then I'll shelve one script and start writing another. And in that way, the years go by, and there's very little money coming in.

The problem with most of the want-to-be authors is that they are unable to focus. Either they have no idea of where to begin, or they have hundreds of ideas and don't know which one to pick. Both scenarios leading to one result... they give up even before they start.

I think, with most writers, their neurosis is finishing things. I have a different neurosis. I'm terribly anxious when it's not finished. Then I become really difficult to live with.

The most important thing in writing is to have written. I can always fix a bad page. I can't fix a blank one.

What do I do when writing isn't going well? Well, I don't write - which is symptom, cure, and cause. And then sometimes I just tell myself, as I'm writing, "I'll fix it later." And sometimes it's true, I do.

I've lost my writing skills since college. I couldn't write a book. It would take a long time.

Don’t sit down in the middle of the woods. If you’re lost in the plot or blocked, retrace your steps to where you went wrong. Then take the other road. And/or change the person. Change the tense. Change the opening page.

There's no agony like [getting started]. You sit in a room, biting pencils, looking at a typewriter, walking about, or casting yourself down on a sofa, feeling you want to cry your head off.

You can fix anything but a blank page.

I suppose half of writing is overcoming the revulsion you feel when you sit down to it.

It’s not the writing part that’s hard. What’s hard is sitting down to write.

When I write I just keep a waste paper basket handy in case I am experiencing a block.

I don't believe in writer's block. Most of writer's block is having too much time on your hands. My mantra is that you can always edit a bad page; you can't edit a blank page.

Better to write twaddle, anything, than nothing at all.

There is no such thing as writer's block for writers whose standards are low enough.

I tend to delay writing by doing more research - it's really the act of writing the piece that I have the hardest time with.

But sometimes when I was starting a new story and I could not get it going, I would sit in front of the fire and squeeze the peel of the little oranges into the edge of the flame and watch the sputter of blue that they made. I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, 'Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.' So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there.

Editing is hard but nowhere NEAR as tough as facing that blank page and blinking cursor each day. You're all alone and no one else can do it. At least with editing you have someone in the trench with you.

I always do the first line well, but I have trouble doing the others.