Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes

There is an art of reading, as well as an art of thinking, and an art of writing.

I really think that reading is just as important as writing when you're trying to be a writer because it's the only apprenticeship we have, it's the only way of learning how to write a story.

Learning how to be a good reader is what makes you a writer.

A literary critic is someone who can't write, but who loves to show he would have been a wonderful writer if only he could!

I was an English major, so I love discussing possibilities and alternate theories.

Reading asks that you bring your whole life experience and your ability to decode the written word and your creative imagination to the page and be a co-author with the writer, because the story is just squiggles on the page unless you have a reader.

Read as much as you can, and then sit down and write.

I take a real interest in the possibilities of teaching - including the practice of bringing creative writing, and serious reading, into the classroom. I am persuaded that since language is alive, much of the challenge has already been met by the poets and novelists we read.

One must be an inventor to read well. There is then creative reading as well as creative writing.

I love reading almost as much as I love writing.

Whether or not a text really is a universe unto itself, it is safe to say that it can only ever be as rich as its most sensitive interpreter.

In reading, we are both scientists and poets.

Read like mad. But try to do it analytically - which can be hard, because the better and more compelling a novel is, the less conscious you will be of its devices. It's worth trying to figure those devices out, however: they might come in useful in your own work.

Literature speaks the language of the imagination, and the study of literature is supposed to train and improve the imagination.

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.

Reading is an active, imaginative act; it takes work.

I had the most incredible English and literature teachers in school, and it really influenced my love of storytelling. It's what made me excited to study journalism in college. I love editorials and documentaries. All of that came from being given the opportunity to lose myself in good writing when I was a kid.

The most important thing is to read as much as you can, like I did. It will give you an understanding of what makes good writing and it will enlarge your vocabulary.

I think poetry can help children deal with the other subjects on the curriculum by enabling them to see a subject in a new way.

There can be no literary equivalent to truth.

I don't think I've ever read poetry, ever. I'm not really book-smart.

I love it when people want to interpret my books.

When I was teaching English and trying to get kids passionate about reading, the most effective weapon I had was 'The Martian Chronicles.'

The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading in order to write. A man will turn over half a library to make a book.

I want to see children curled up with books, finding an awareness of themselves as they discover other people's thoughts. I want them to make the connection that books are people's stories, that writing is talking on paper, and I want them to write their own stories. I'd like my books to provide that connection for them.