Writers Block Quotes

You can live with me in this house I've built out of writers blocks.

I wrote my first book when I was 22 years old. I have a way with words and I love to write. I can write without getting writers block so I knew, it was a gift.

writing about a writer's block is better than not writing at all

Never stop writing because you have run out of ideas.

If I waited for perfection... I would never write a word.

The free-lance writer is a man who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps.

When I'm writing, I write. And then it's as if the muse is convinced that I'm serious and says, 'Okay. Okay. I'll come.'

Planning to write is not writing. Outlining, researching, talking to people about what you're doing, none of that is writing. Writing is writing.

Writing is 90% procrastination. It is a matter of doing everything you can to avoid writing, until it is about four in the morning and you reach the point where you have to write.

Read a lot. Write a lot. Have fun.

Just write every day of your life. Read intensely.

I try to leave out the parts readers skip.

It is perfectly okay to write garbage – as long as you edit brilliantly.

Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere.

Never stop writing because you have run out of ideas. Fill the lacunae of inspiration by tidily copying out what is already written.

That famous writer’s block is a myth as far as I’m concerned. I think bad writers must have a great difficulty writing. They don’t want to do it. They have become writers out of reasons of ambition. It must be a great strain to them to make marks on a page when they really have nothing much to say, and don’t enjoy doing it. I’m not so sure what I have to say but I certainly enjoy making sentences.

Writing is 90 percent procrastination: reading magazines, eating cereal out of the box, watching infomercials.

There's no such thing as writer's block. That was invented by people in California who couldn't write.

What I try to do is write. I may write for two weeks ‘the cat sat on the mat, that is that, not a rat,’.... And it might be just the most boring and awful stuff. But I try. When I’m writing, I write. And then it’s as if the muse is convinced that I’m serious and says, ‘Okay. Okay. I’ll come.

A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.

I might have missed my calling as an editor. In the spring, the sight of my empty garden beds gives me the horticultural equivalent of writers' block: So much space! So many plants to choose among, and yet none of them seem quite right!

Writers block: when I get it, it's because my subconscious spotted that I'd make a huge structural mistake in constructing a novel before my conscious mind became aware of it, and threw on the brakes. So I've learned not to sweat it: take two days off, then back up a chapter, read through, and try to work out why I'm suddenly uneasy about continuing.

I think every writer struggles in some way with writers block. The trick is to plan out what you are going to say beforehand. I found out that if you make an outline you're much less likely to get blocked when you get into the middle of the story.

I haven't had writer's block. I think it's because my process involves writing very badly.

I spend days with writers' block. It is a problem.

The best way is always to stop when you are going good and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day ... you will never be stuck. Always stop while you are going good and don't think about it or worry about it until you start to write the next day. That way your subconscious will work on it all the time. But if you think about it consciously or worry about it you will kill it and your brain will be tired before you start.

I think writer's block is simply the dread that you are going to write something horrible. But as a writer, I believe that if you sit down at the keys long enough, sooner or later something will come out.

Writer’s block is my unconscious mind telling me that something I’ve just written is either unbelievable or unimportant to me, and I solve it by going back and reinventing some part of what I’ve already written so that when I write it again, it is believable and interesting to me. Then I can go on. Writer’s block is never solved by forcing oneself to “write through it,” because you haven’t solved the problem that caused your unconscious mind to rebel against the story, so it still won’t work – for you or for the reader.

I had writers block for months afterwards because I was just so taken aback by all of the sounds I was hearing. It's almost like hearing the most beautiful music you've ever heard, so you're like, "What's the point of me making anything?" It was this living sonic organism so the idea of recording something just seemed like taking this living thing and mummifying it.

If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don't just stick there scowling at the problem. But don't make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people's words will pour in where your lost words should be.

The scariest moment is always just before you start.

You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.

We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and starting on the first one.

I actually prefer to work in as many different genres as possible as often as possible because I actually think the best way to be inspired and avoid any writers block or things like that is actually to be able to go from a comedy to an action to a horror to a adventure, that actually makes it easy for me to start over and get new ideas, and it keeps things interesting.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started