David Means Quotes

I guess I feel it's funny to be looked to for advice on writing when I am still taking in so much from other people.

You cannot teach creativity - how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be.

It seems to me in the past it's been a good thing, as a writer, to have experiences I hadn't expected.

When I went to college I took a creative writing class and decided in a week to be a writer.

If writers learn more from their books than do readers, perhaps I may have begun to learn.

I think I'm more sympathetic to writers, to the work and the struggle and the craft of it, than when I was in graduate school at NYU and was very judgmental.

It really wasn't until I was in college when I began to write more and more, and I realized I was scheduling my entire life around my writing.

My aunt got me interested in journalism - she found an old typewriter, had it worked over, put it on the dining room table, gave me a stack of paper and said, 'Play like you're a writer.'

I never really knew I wanted to 'be' a writer, but I was always writing from a very young age. It became more conscious as an ideal when I was in my twenties.

I want to get within myself and write. I really, really want to write.

Young writers need to be encouraged to write - just write - with no restrictions on form, style or content.

Mr. Olsen in the fifth grade made me want to be a writer. He said, 'Chuck, you do this really well. And this is much better than setting fires, so keep it up.' That made me a writer.

I don't think many of us launched ourselves into the world of writing books fully formed.

When I started writing, it felt good, and I knew I was in the right genre.

Every time I wrote fiction, I was discouraged, and every time I wrote nonfiction, I was encouraged.

I always wanted to be a writer. In the beginning, I thought I had to rewrite 'Gone with the Wind,' but eventually, I found my way and realized that wasn't me.

I wrote all the time, and I had teachers who encouraged it.

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

I didn't know I was gonna be a writer when I started out.

When I was a kid and wanted to grow up to be a writer, I assumed I would be writing about animals and children because that's what I cared about and read about. But I never did.

Once I started writing, I realized just how much I really enjoyed it. I was kinda good at it, so I kept at it.

I didn't know anything about writers. It never occurred to me they were regular people and that I could grow up to become one, even though I loved to make up stories inside my head.

I like to begin every screenplay with a burst of delusional self-confidence. It tends to fade pretty quickly, but (for me, at least) there doesn't seem to be any other way to start writing a script.

Everyone thinks when they start writing that they can't do it. I was lucky. My sister Delia was the most important person in terms of encouraging me.

I'm not sure if I always wanted to be a writer, but I was always writing.