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Stephen King Quotes - Page 21

All Quotes Accidents Advertising Age Art Beer Belief Bones Boredom Bullshit Business Cancer Character Childhood Children Choices Coincidence College Country Crime Culture Dad Dancing Darkness Death Depression Devil Doubt Drinking Dying Earth Eternity Evil Expectations Failing Fear Feelings Fighting Film Friendship Fun Funny Giving Giving Up Growing Up Halloween Happy Endings Hard Work Hate Heart Heaven Home Hope Horror House Hurt Imagination Inspiration Inspirational Intelligence Jesus Journey Joy Judging Judgment Kissing Language Laughter Leaving Letting Go Life Listening Literature Logic Loneliness Losing Love Luck Lying Madness Magic Memories Mercy Moon Morning Motivational Myth Optimism Pain Past Pride Purpose Quitting Rain Reading Reality Redemption Religion Responsibility Risk Running Sadness Sanity School Seduction Sin Skins Sleep Son Sorrow Soul Struggle Style Summer Talent Teaching Telepathy Terror Time Today Truth Understanding Universe Waiting Wall War Water Wife Winning Work Worry Writing

Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule.

Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule.

Writing, Thought Provoking, Thesaurus

A writer's notebook is the best way in the world to immortalize bad ideas. My idea about a good idea is one that sticks around and sticks around and sticks around.

Notebook, Ideas, World

Writing fiction, especially a long work of fiction, can be a difficult, lonely job; it's like crossing the Atlantic Ocean in a bathtub. There's plenty of opportunity for self-doubt.

Lonely, Jobs, Ocean

Stephen King (2002). “On Writing”, p.210, Simon and Schuster

At its most basic we are discussing a learned skill (writing), but do we not agree that sometimes the most basic skills can create things far beyond our expectations? We are talking about tools and carpentry, about words and style... but as we move along, you'd do well to remember that we are also talking about magic.

Moving, Writing, Talking

Stephen King (2002). “On Writing”, p.131, Simon and Schuster

I don't take notes; I don't outline, I don't do anything like that. I just flail away at the goddamn thing. I'm a salami writer. I try to write good salami, but salami is salami. You can't sell it as caviar.

Writing, Trying, Caviar

As a rule, I don't worry about genre. I just want to tell a good story, with characters that interest me and my readers.

Character, Worry, Stories

Write what you like, then imbue it with life and make it unique by blending in your own personal knowledge of life, friendship, relationships, sex, and work. Especially work. People love to read about work. God knows why, but they do.

Sex, Work, Writing

Stephen King (2002). “On Writing”, p.157, Simon and Schuster

There are, occasionally, writers who are able to combine both story and style. They are, of course, the best. You get a spectacular view and you also get to look at it from the backseat of a chauffeur-driven Cadillac. In the field of fantasy, those writers able to combine story-as-narration with story-as-style are even rarer. But there are a few...the late Theodore Sturgeon, the early Ray Bradbury...and Richard Christian Matheson. A brilliant chip off the old block.

Christian, Block, Views

It was how wars really ended, Dieffenbaker supposed -- not at truce tables but in cancer wards and office cafeterias and traffic jams. Wars died one tiny piece at a time, each piece something that fell like a memory, each lost like an echo that fades in winding hills. In the end even war ran up the white flag. Or so he hoped. He hoped that in the end even war surrendered.

Memories, War, Cancer

The road and the tale have both been long, would you not say so? The trip has been long and the cost has been high... but no great thing was ever attained easily. A long tale, like a tall Tower, must be built a stone at a time.

Long, Towers, Cost

FaceBook post by Stephen King from Dec 04, 2013

I’m not particularly keen on writing which exhaustively describes the physical characteristics of the people in the story and what they’re wearing… I can always get a J. Crew catalogue… …So spare me, if you please, the hero’s ‘sharply intelligent blue eyes’ and ‘outthrust determined chin’.

Hero, Writing, Eye

I believe the first draft of a book — even a long one — should take no more than three months…Any longer and — for me, at least — the story begins to take on an odd foreign feel, like a dispatch from the Romanian Department of Public Affairs, or something broadcast on high-band shortwave duiring a period of severe sunspot activity.

Believe, Book, Long

Stephen King (2002). “On Writing”, p.149, Simon and Schuster

I think the best stories always end up being about the people rather than the event, which is to say character-driven.

Character, Thinking, People

Stephen King (2002). “On Writing”, p.189, Simon and Schuster

Once I start work on a project, I don’t stop and I don’t slow down unless I absolutely have to. If I don’t write every day, the characters begin to stale off in my mind – they begin to seem like characters instead of real people. The tale’s narrative cutting edge starts to rust and I begin to lose my hold on the story’s plot and pace. Worst of all, the excitement of spinning something new begins to fade. The work starts to feel like work, and for most writers that is the smooch of death.

Real, Writing, Character

"22 lessons from Stephen King on how to be a great writer". www.businessinsider.com. August 11, 2015.

because the hardest boss a man can ever have is himself.

Men, Boss, Hardest

Stephen King (2008). “Duma Key: A Novel”, p.267, Simon and Schuster

Mornings belong to whatever is new; the current composition. Afternoons are for naps and letters.

Morning, Naps, Afternoon

Stephen King (2000). “On Writing: A Memoir Of The Craft”, p.96, Simon and Schuster

The writer must have a good imagination to begin with, but the imagination has to be muscular, which means it must be exercised in a disciplined way, day in and day out, by writing, failing, succeeding and revising.

Writing, Mean, Imagination

"Writing Advice from Stephen King & Jerry Jenkins". Interview with Jessica Strawser, www.writersdigest.com. July 21, 2009.

He had a massive stroke. He died with his tie on. Do you think that could be our generation's equivalent of that old saying about dying with your boots on?

Thinking, Our Generation, Ties

Stephen King (2008). “The Stand”, p.361, Anchor

The mystery of the universe is not time but size.

Size, Mystery, Universe

It might be that the biggest division in the world isn't men and women but folks who like cats and folks who like dogs" - (L.T.'s Theory of Pets)

Dog, Cat, Men

Roland could not understand why anyone would want cocaine or any other illegal drug, for that matter, in a world where such a powerful one as sugar was so plentiful and cheap.

Powerful, Drug, World

Stephen King (2016). “The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three”, p.114, Simon and Schuster

Ninety-eight percent of what goes on in people's heads is none of their smucking business.

Ninety Eight, People, Goes On

Stephen King (2008). “Lisey's Story: A Novel”, p.318, Simon and Schuster

The low bird is not picked tenderly out of the dust by its fellows; rather, it is dispatched quickly and without mercy.

Dust, Bird, Mercy

Stephen King (2008). “Carrie”, p.52, Anchor

When you own a piano, it's harder to think about moving.

Moving, Thinking, Piano

Stephen King (2016). “Misery”, p.171, Simon and Schuster

Every book you pick up has its own lesson or lessons, and quite often the bad books have more to teach than the good ones.

Book, Lessons, Teach

Stephen King (2000). “On Writing: A Memoir Of The Craft”, p.90, Simon and Schuster

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