There are three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see.
Where observation is concerned, chance favors only the prepared mind.
I would say that I am an academic in politics. I have never abandoned my academic approach to observe reality, independently from the subject and its constant changes.
I am still very observant. I am absorbed by people and why they do what they do.
I am the audience. I want to observe people. Even when I'm playing drums onstage, I'm watching people. I'm looking at them and their faces and their T-shirts and their signs. And travelling by motorcycle, especially, the world is just coming at me.
You can observe a lot by watching.
In matters of observation chance favors only the prepared mind. (not literal translation) - Dan's les champs de observation le hasard ne favorise que les esprits prepares.
My only advantage as a reporter is that I am so physically small, so temperamentally unobtrusive, and so neurotically inarticulate that people tend to forget that my presence runs counter to their best interests.
If I should certainly say to a novice, 'Write from experience and experience only,' I should feel that this was rather a tantalizing monition if I were not careful immediately to add, 'Try to be one of the people on whom nothing is lost.'
The really good stand up comedians can be angry but relatable, and they have interestingly humanizing personalities. Their observational skills are far greater than mine, so I'll just stick to reading lines off a page.
I write about personal experiences. I write about things that have happened to me and the people around me, so you just sort of keep this antenna up and on the lookout for things to say.
A writer is a spectator, looking at everything with a highly critical eye.
I'm very observational in my comedy and what I create with the characters that I'm blessed to play. I don't believe comedy needs to be offensive, and I don't believe it needs to be a mockery of anything.
Medicine is probably one of the best backgrounds for a writer to find stories. I always think cops and docs have the best background because we see so much of human behavior, such a range of human emotions.
To be a writer you need to see things as they are, and to see things as they are you need a certain basic innocence.
A responsible Warrior is one who has proved able to observe and to learn.
I love reading people. I really enjoy watching, observing, and being able to figure out a person, the reason they wore that dress, the reason they smell the way they do.
When dealing with children there is greater need for observing than of probing
One of the gifts of being a writer is that it gives you an excuse to do things, to go places and explore. Another is that writing motivates you to look closely at life, at life as it lurches by and tramps around.
When you're drawing from observation and experience, whether you intend to or not, you'll create a more relatable cartoon.
William Regal once told us he people-watched when he was in the ring. He would see things that people would do. And if they annoyed him, chances are they would annoy someone else. A lot of times I'll just people watch when I'm traveling or at the airport or living everyday life.
Holmes serves as an ideal model of how we can learn to see and think better.
All we need is a meteorologist who has once been soaked to the skin without ill effect. No one can write knowingly of the weather who walks bent over on wet days.
Fiction writers are strange beasts. They are, like all writers, observers first and foremost. Everything that happens to and around them is potential material for a story, and they look at it that way.
I can never bring you to realize the importance of sleeves, the suggestiveness of thumb-nails, or the great issues that may hang from a boot-lace.
