✺

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

—Maya Angelou

~

Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.

—Louis L'Amour

~

Committed to page,
I write a rhyme,
sometimes won't finish for days.
Scrutinize my literature:
From the large to the miniature,
I mathematically add-minister.
Subtract the wack—
Selector,
wheel it back,
I'm feelin’ that.

—Mos Def

~

Write with the door closed.
Rewrite with the door open.

—Stephen King

~

The only kind of writing is rewriting.

—Ernest Hemingway

~

The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.

—Terry Pratchett

~

You don't start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it's good stuff, and then gradually you get better at it.

—Octavia E. Butler

~

The scariest moment is always just before you start.

—Stephen King

~

If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.

—Toni Morrison

~

To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it's about, but the inner music the words make.

—Truman Capote

~

The beautiful part of writing is that you don't have to get it right the first time, unlike, say, a brain surgeon.

—Robert Cormier

~

Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing and learn as you go.

—E.L. Doctorow

~

I write to give myself strength. I write to be the characters that I am not. I write to explore all the things I'm afraid of.

—Joss Whedon

~

A professional writer is an amateur who didn't quit.

—Richard Bach

~

The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say.

—Anaïs Nin

~

Easy reading is damn hard writing.

—Nathaniel Hawthorne

~

If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn't brood. I'd type a little faster.

—Isaac Asimov

~

There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.

—W. Somerset Maugham

~

One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.

—Jack Kerouac

~

It was a dark and stormy night…

—Snoopy

✺

Poem: The Unwritten

Poem: The Suggestion Box

Poem: Velocity

Poem: Royal Aristocrat

Poem: How to Write a Poem

Poem: “I write until my face is erased”

Poem: We Write Nasty Notes at the Academic Conference

Poem: Unable to Write It

Poem: Anima Writes a Letter Home

Poem: Trying to Write

Poem: Trying to Write Again

Poem: Writing in the Afterlife

Poem: The Trouble with Poetry

Poem: Workshop

Poem: Why I Would Rather Be a Painter

Poetry Everywhere

First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing

The Story You Need to Tell

What If?

Writing Down the Bones

Burn after writing

Corporeal writing

The Writer’s Block

The 3 A.M. Epiphany

The 4 A.M. Breakthrough

Writing Flash Fiction

Writers on Writing

Not quite what I was planning: Six-word memoirs

The Practice of Poetry

The Art of Writing

The Screenwriter’s Bible

Writing Better Lyrics

The Portable MFA

Description

Beginnings, Middles, & Ends

Conflict, Action & Suspense

Plot

Setting

Scene & Structure

Characters & Viewpoint

Stephen King: On Writing

Stephen King on the creative process

J.K. Rowling on writing & creating

The future of writing is a lot like hip-hop

The creative process of a paralyzed screenwriter

The pandemic logs

The Practical Stylist

✺