Writing Excellence Quotes

I never had a highfalutin' view of what I write.

Shakespeare was a man who wrote poetry. I'm a man who writes poetry. Why not compare yourself to the best?

Of course, there are those critics - New York critics as a rule - who say, 'Well, Maya Angelou has a new book out and of course it's good but then she's a natural writer.' Those are the ones I want to grab by the throat and wrestle to the floor because it takes me forever to get it to sing. I work at the language.

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing.

The true function of a writer is to produce a masterpiece and no other task is of any consequence.

As a writer, you have to believe you're one of the best writers in the world. To sit down every day at the typewriter filled with self-doubt is not a good idea.

Great writing is great writing. It's as simple as all that.

Anything well written with good language and clarity and honesty is worth doing. It comes out of the same tradition as Shakespeare.

I save the best of myself for novels, and I believe it shows.

Nobody's strong enough to stand up under a flood of weak material.

I'd like my writing to be recognized with a Grammy.

Irene Nemirovsky was a prolific writer punctiliously devoted to her craft.

It doesn't matter what kind of book you write - you ought to write it well and with some kind of style and elegance.

If something is well-written, it has a chance to be good and if it's not well-written, it will not be good. It could even become popular, but it won't be good.

You don't make a decision about being a writer. There was a point, aged 21, when it became clear that this is who I am. The choice is how good you are going to be at it and how hard you are going to work.

I feel as if I'm clearly part of a trend among writers who take themselves seriously - and I confess to taking myself as seriously as the next writer.

I think it's the people who have no doubt that every word they put down is gold that probably don't write very well.

I don't think anything you've written is immortal as yet.

The highest praise a writer can give another is to say he wishes he had written his book. I wish I had written Forty Words for Sorrow. Giles Blunt has a tremendous talent. If you miss Forty Words for Sorrow, you'll miss one of best novels of 2001.

The greatest sin for a writer is to be boring.

My preference is for really good writing, and I just really don't care where it is.

If you want to be a good writer, be the best writer in the world. That's what I've done.

The best author will be the one who is ashamed to become a writer.

There's something very strange about associating me with that prize. I had hoped for it in a more directed way as a journalist. Somehow as a journalist you know there are Pulitzers out there and you can work hard and get one. To win it for Fiction seems unbelievable.

It seemed impossible that a scrappy book like 'Goon Squad' could win an award like that. It's such an iconic honor. I think what the Pulitzer means to me is that I'll need to work very, very hard to try to live up to it.