Writing Quotes
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I think technique can be taught but I think the only way to learn to write is to read, and I see writing and reading as completely related. One almost couldn't exist without the other.
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Really important books to me are the classics. I try very hard to read them well - you know, especially once I got serious about writing. So, reading Tolstoy several times - 'War and Peace,' 'The Kreutzer Sonata' - all those were really important to me.
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I have ADD or something. Even when I am doing something, it's me on the computer, I'm painting and I'm writing music. I have to rotate what I'm doing every 15 minutes.
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I love writing for other actors, women of African descent and people who are generally underrepresented.
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'Show up at the desk' is one of the first rules of writing, but for 'Wolf Hall' I was about 30 years late.
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Good acting is all in the writing. If it isn't on the page, then it really won't make any difference. You cannot act on force of personality alone.
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Writing on your own is, in a way, a very lonely profession. There's no one there to help you.
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Good writing is often about trying to investigate something you feel is missing and trying to put it back.
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Frankly, as much as I love to improvise, it hasn't been difficult to stick to the script on 'Mad Men.' The writing is so precise, and the story so carefully crafted, that I don't think there's room - or need - for ad libbing. I could never come up with dialogue as lovely as these writers do, anyway.
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I love Dexter. I love Top Chef. I can't wait for it to come back. I love Friday Night Lights. I think TV is in a great place right now. It's definitely getting better and better. I think there is some of the most complete writing for women and female characters, they're done in television production and not really film production.
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The problem with writing a monthly book is that you're going through your work like a man running for a bus, red-faced and out of breath. There isn't time for reflection or critical self-examination.
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A friend of mine encouraged me to try rapping, so I started experimenting with it, writing verses, seeing if I could fit an extra word or syllable into each line without tripping myself up.
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I do, I do!. There were songs like Ryan Adams' song 'Come Pick Me Up' that was sort of part of the writing. The Patty Griffin song 'Long Ride Home' you just try and earn with your script. Most great songs are their own movie without your help. So you just try to earn them really.
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I wasn't very good about juggling family and my career. I was interested in who was coming to the children's birthday party, what my son was writing. I was thinking about Legos.
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I often feel like not writing! Sometimes I overcome it by just sitting there until writing happens. Sometimes I don't write, because books often need periods of percolation.
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I've always been fascinated by the concept of reincarnation. I learned that many brilliant people were interested in reincarnation, including Carl Jung. I'm a big Jungian. So I began writing novels involving theories integrating past and present, even if the past element in the novel took place 500 or 1,000 years ago.
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Taylor Swift dates guys so she can write a breakup song about them. I don't think she's dating for love - I think she's dating for creativity. So let's get her off the market and put her in dating detox. If she really wants love, she has to stop writing music about them.
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Sometimes I have a melody in my head; sometimes it's just a verse. I read lines from a book or movies that I watch and grab a few quotes and start writing on paper. From there, I record a really rough version and work on the song.
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I love writing for young adults because they are such a wonderful audience, they are good readers, and they care about the books they read.
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Writing a book, you can only get stopped by yourself.
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By writing... in the language of his society, a poet takes a large step toward it. It is society's job to meet him halfway, that is, to open his book and read it.
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I love opera, I love writing for the voice, I love telling stories with music.
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When you write what you know, you stay in control. One of the first things I encourage my writing students to do is to lose control - say what they want to say, break structure.
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Occasionally when I'm procrastinating writing, I'll while away the hours on iTunes. You can just keep going forever and find these bands you'd never normally hear of.
