I often write in pencil on paper and then type up later. It's much quicker than using a keyboard.
If somebody says that they want to write a book but do not know what to write about, they will never write a book.
I think the only boundaries are individual and personal. A writer should be free to write about anything he or she wants to, including the twin towers. I have made small references to 9/11 in my past two books.
Write about society as news and treat it like sociology.
It came about as follows: over the years when I was involved in dianetics, I wrote the beginnings of many stories. I would get an idea, and then write the beginning, and then never touch it again.
We write not only for children but also for their parents. They, too, are serious children.
Yes, I do often write poems from the mind, but I hope I don't ignore feelings and emotions.
When I see these guys write all this macho stuff I want to smash their heads.
I wanted to write about what we were doing at the French Laundry, the recipes and the stories.
When I write nonfiction, it's always absolutely true. There will be no moment in my nonfiction where I have made something up and have to apologize to the bullying hostess of a talk show.
I want to sell to people my own age, because that's the way I write songs.
I would say I'm a storyteller first, but game making is very wrapped up in how I think of story. If I were to have a story idea, and I decided to write a novel with it instead, I'd have to very consciously de-couple it from gamedom - for example, deliberately add in things that could not be represented in a game scene.
I like to write when I feel spiteful. It is like having a good sneeze.
A superhuman will is needed in order to write, and I am only a man.
If people would write exactly what I wanted to read I wouldn't feel so compelled to write myself.
I write short stories, and I wrote a play.
I am really impressed by lawyers who write books and tell us that they never lost a case. Most lawyers who have never lost a case have not had enough hard cases. But there are very difficult cases out there.
Once I got married, I started working from an office. I found that having somewhere to go that isn't my house is mentally helpful: 'This is the place where I answer email and write blog posts,' and 'over there is the place where I do the dishes.'
I know this is going to sound very self-serving, and I apologize for it, but if you can write comedy, you can pretty much write anything, because it's the hardest. It's the most technically demanding, the most precisely evaluated form of writing. People know if it works or not. There's a big button marked 'fail,' and that's when nobody laughs.
Every book I've written has been a different attempt to understand something, and the success or failure of the previous one is irrelevant. I write the book I want.
That sense of failure, I don't know where people put it who don't write songs and aren't able to emote physically. It must go somewhere.
I think that as I continue to write, my writing I hope will become more controversial and more provocative.
I think that most writers who wait until they're inspired to write are just waiting for the fear to subside.
If you ever want to get the facts straight about me or the Batman, please write to the original source, myself, for the truth, instead of second guessing.
I write songs about stuff that I can't really get past personally - and then I write a song about it and I feel better.
You're not gonna write a hundred songs and have a hundred entirely different ideas. It's a matter of finding the ones that are the freshest and most unique.
As soon as I am up, I brush my hair. I eat breakfast first: tea and brown bread, and sometimes a fresh fruit juice like orange or grapefruit. I write notes on the previous day in my notebook, then I shower.
I wanted to write about my mother as she should have been if she had not been messed up by World War I.
It's a phobia I have. I never assume I'm going to be able to write another album after I finish one.
If you write about race in 1850, you end up talking about race today because in many ways, so little has changed.
It is humiliating to remain with our hands folded while others write history. It matters little who wins. To make a people great it is necessary to send them to battle even if you have to kick them in the pants. That is what I shall do.
I want to do things or write things that make people feel a bit more beautiful or tragic or something because there are so many other things than just funny.
One of the things when you're drawing a comic book is that you're spending four or five times as long to draw it as the writer takes to write it. In my career I've had to spend a week drawing something that a writer has thrown out in an hour. And there's nothing worse than having to work on something that no previous thought has gone into.
At one point I intended to write precursor and sequel novels, about the establishment of the Web and its next evolution, but I am very unlikely to now; they would take place in a different universe.
I want to see children curled up with books, finding an awareness of themselves as they discover other people's thoughts. I want them to make the connection that books are people's stories, that writing is talking on paper, and I want them to write their own stories. I'd like my books to provide that connection for them.
I have no idea why I write. The old standards are: I like to express my feelings, stretch my imagination, earn money.
