Vicki Delany Quotes

I think that, in principle, a workshop is such a beautiful idea - an environment in which writers who are collectively apprenticed to the craft of writing can come together in order to collectively improve.

I believe I'm a better writer now than I was when I started. I'm grateful that I had good guidance because you don't make it in this business without good editors and a lot of support from your publishers.

I have very specific advice for aspiring writers: go to New York. And if you can't go to New York, go to the place that represents New York to you, where the standards for writing are high, there are other people who share your dreams, and where you can talk, talk, talk about your interests.

I found the writing arena to be much less competitive.

It's not a problem to be surrounded by other writers if that's the craft that you're doing. I suppose if you get obsessed with the notion of being a writer more than the writing itself, that would be bad. But I live near really smart, thoughtful people who take writing very seriously, and I can meet them for breakfast and talk books.

I started creative writing classes at Aberdeen Central Library, and the writer-in-residence there, Todd McEwen, encouraged me a great deal. He showed my stories to his editor, and I thought that was just what happened to everyone who took his classes!

I spent several years acquiring the obsessive, day-to-day discipline that's needed if you want to write professionally, then several more, highly valuable years studying fiction writing at the University of Iowa.

Writing is no dying art form in America because most published writers here accept the wisdom and the necessity of encouraging the talent that follows in their footsteps.

Grub Street Writers is the reason I've stayed in Boston. I started teaching for Grub back in 1997, when founder Eve Bridburg, a Boston University M.A. alumna, as I am, kindly gave me my first job out of grad school.

I think more talented writers should get involved in the industry, yes, of course. But that doesn't presuppose that those writers have to be novelists or screenwriters.

I do have the feeling that other writers can't help you with writing. I've gone to writers' conferences and writers' sessions and writers' clinics, and the more I see of them, the more I'm sure it's the wrong direction. It isn't the place where you learn to write.

As an author and a burgeoning screenwriter, the fact of the matter is I cannot do this alone.

Read everything you can on writing. Join online forums and critique groups, go to conferences, get feedback, and learn, learn, learn!

I am very interested in people trying to write because I don't have a big academic background at all.

If you're young enough, any kind of writing you do for a short period of time is a marvelous apprenticeship.

Most people won't realize that writing is a craft. You have to take your apprenticeship in it like anything else.

To practice - write each and every day if possible - then try to attend professional writer's conferences where you can learn your craft, get to know fellow writers, and meet editors and agents.

I am in the Master of Professional Writing program teaching Humor Writing, Literary and Dramatic.

If you're a writer, you're always working.

Writing can't be taught.

One of the things I learnt over the years is that there is a craft to writing, like there is a craft to acting. I hadn't done my apprenticeship as a writer. I did try to be a writer for hire but I'm not any good at it.

I assume that - because you can get degrees in journalism from very reputable universities - I assume that people can be trained to be journalists. I've never been entirely certain that anyone can be trained to be a novelist in the same way.

However great a man's natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.

I like helping other writers who don't know what to do or where to go in New York.

I believe strongly in writing groups such as Romance Writers Of America that offer support, information and networking.