Robert Silverberg Quotes

Writers aren't born, they're made - from practice, reading, and a lot of caffeine.

The only way to learn writing is by writing. Talent, as charming as it sounds, amounts to no more than 12 per cent of the process. Work is 80 per cent. The remaining 8 per cent is 'luck' or 'zeitgeist' - in short, things that are not in our hands.

Read a lot, write a lot is the great commandment.

Writing doesn't come easily to anyone, I think, certainly not to me. But pressure and practice does lend a certain fluency, I think - the more sentences you write, the more sentences you have written, if that slightly Zen confection makes any sense.

I think writing well takes a little bit of talent and an awful lot of work.

The main thing about writing is... writing. Sitting your butt down in the chair and doing the work.

You become a great writer by writing.

For any writers at all, read everything you can and then put your butt in the chair and write. That's all there is to it.

The only way to learn and hone your craft is by working hard and writing regularly.

If you wish to be a writer, write.

All I can say is, hey, if you have fun doing what you do, if you have fun playing soccer, the creativity is just going to come as time goes on.

If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There's no way around these two things that I'm aware of, no shortcut.

Being a writer involves writing. You've got to commit to sitting down and writing instead of Xbox or Netflix.

I don't see how you can write well if you're not reading well at the same time. I think the only risk is reading too many books of one 'type' in a row.

You don't turn out as many books as I did then by sitting around, being cozy with the family.

I'm not patient - and I'm getting more impatient as I get older - but I am disciplined about writing, and I want that on my tombstone: 'He wasn't patient, but he was disciplined.'

Writing is like playing golf - you have to keep working at your swing.

The secret to being a writer is that you have to write. It's not enough to think about writing or to study literature or plan a future life as an author. You really have to lock yourself away, alone, and get to work.

What I've learned is that you get better at writing by writing, and that 'youthful energy' will only get you so far.

It's easy to get discouraged; just keep writing because you love to do it, and you'll keep improving.

I've found that writers who don't read really can't write.

Basketball requires discipline. So does writing. Basketball requires practice. So does writing. Basketball requires resilience. So does writing.

We all start out with the same alphabet. We are all unique. Talent is not the most important thing --- discipline and dedication are. Craft can be learned but desire and longing are innate. Despite the demands of school and just being young, try to write SOMETHING every day --- a description, a captured emotion, a simile, a metaphor. Read, for crying out loud! A writer must read the way a ball player must go to the ballfield every day to practice. Everything is possible in this world of ours--- and so's publication.

You can't learn to play the piano without playing the piano, you can't learn to write without writing, and, in many ways, you can't learn to think without thinking. Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That's why it's so hard.

To read and to write. Some writers have to be told to write. They think their job is to meet agents and have experiences and they can just be rich and famous. Their job is to write. Some really don't realize that. And you can't write unless you read.