Insight for Writing
May 31 Quote: James Patterson
“Stop trying to write sentences, and start trying to write stories.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjqaWfEAvgQ
WIKI: James Brendan Patterson (born March 22, 1947) is an American author and philanthropist. Among his works are the Alex Cross, Michael Bennett, Women’s Murder Club, Maximum Ride, Daniel X, NYPD Red, Witch and Wizard, and Private series, as well as many stand-alone thrillers, non-fiction and romance novels. His books have sold more than 300 million copies, and he was the first person to sell 1 million e-books.
May 30 Quote: Harlan Ellison
“People on the outside think there’s something magical about writing, that you go up in the attic at midnight and cast the bones and come down in the morning with a story, but it isn’t like that. You sit in back of the typewriter and you work, and that’s all there is to it.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B-ony5KGdk
WIKI: Harlan Jay Ellison (May 27, 1934 – June 28, 2018)[4] was an American writer, known for his prolific and influential work in New Wave speculative fiction, and for his outspoken, combative personality. … His published works include more than 1,700 short stories, novellas, screenplays, comic book scripts, teleplays, essays, and a wide range of criticism covering literature, film, television, and print media. Some of his best-known work includes the Star Trek episode “The City on the Edge of Forever,” his “A Boy and His Dog” cycle, and his short stories “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream,” and “‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman.” … Ellison won numerous awards, including multiple Hugos, Nebulas, and Edgars.
May 29 Quote: Ursula K. Le Guin
“The unread story is not a story; it is little black marks on wood pulp. The reader, reading it, makes it live: a live thing, a story.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LCzb45xuiI
WIKI: Ursula Kroeber Le Guin (Oct. 21, 1929 – Jan. 22, 2018) was an American author. She is best known for her works of speculative fiction, including science fiction works set in her Hainish Universe, and the “Earthsea” fantasy series. First published in 1959, she had a literary career spanning nearly sixty years, during which she released more than twenty novels and over a hundred short stories, in addition to many volumes of poetry, literary criticism, translations, and children’s books. Frequently described as an “author of science fiction,” Le Guin has said she would prefer to be known as an “American novelist,” and has also been called a “major voice in American Letters.”
Published May 29, 2019
May 28 Quote: Barbara Kingsolver
“Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It’s the one and only thing you have to offer.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0eH6HFWxfg&feature=youtu.be
WIKI: Barbara Kingsolver (born April 8, 1955) is an American novelist, essayist and poet. She was raised in rural Kentucky and lived briefly in the Congo in her early childhood. Kingsolver earned degrees in biology at DePauw University and the University of Arizona and worked as a freelance writer before she began writing novels. Her widely known works include “The Poisonwood Bible,” the tale of a missionary family in the Congo, and “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,” a non-fiction account of her family’s attempts to eat locally.
PS: Learn about “Alliterations.” Read the article. Watch the video:
https://theprose.com/post/277235/literary-devices-alliteration
May 27 Quote: Ray Bradbury
“Any man who keeps working is not a failure. He may not be a great writer, but if he applies the old-fashioned virtues of hard, constant labor, he’ll eventually make some kind of career for himself as a writer.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yoe8pLhfFys&feature=youtu.be
WIKI: Ray Douglas Bradbury (Aug. 22, 1920 – June 5, 2012) was an American author and screenwriter. He worked in a variety of genres, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, and mystery fiction. Predominantly known for writing the iconic dystopian novel “Fahrenheit 451” (1953), and his science-fiction and horror-story collections, “The Martian Chronicles” (1950), “The Illustrated Man” (1951), and “I Sing the Body Electric” (1969), Bradbury was one of the most celebrated 20th- and 21st-century American writers. While most of his best known work is in speculative fiction, he also wrote in other genres, such as the coming-of-age novel “Dandelion Wine” (1957) and the fictionalized memoir “Green Shadows, White Whale” (1992).
May 26 Quote: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLhEOENcTB4&feature=youtu.be
WIKI: Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (Nov. 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American writer. In a career spanning over 50 years, Vonnegut published 14 novels, three short story collections, five plays, and five works of non-fiction, with further collections being published after his death. He is most famous for his darkly satirical, best-selling novel “Slaughterhouse-Five” (1969).
May 25 Quote: John Steinbeck
“Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=796E0Uu18BA&feature=youtu.be
WIKI: John Ernst Steinbeck Jr. (Feb. 27, 1902 – Dec. 20, 1968) was an American author. He won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature “for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social perception.” He has been called “a giant of American letters,” and many of his works are considered classics of Western literature.
May 24 Quote: Dylan Thomas
“A good poem is a contribution to reality. The world is never the same once a good poem has been added to it. A good poem helps to change the shape of the universe, helps to extend everyone’s knowledge of himself and the world around him.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gn5Je7M9Los&feature=youtu.be
WIKI: Dylan Marlais Thomas (Oct. 27, 1914 – Nov. 9, 1953) was a Welsh poet and writer whose works include the poems “Do not go gentle into that good night” and “And death shall have no dominion”; the ‘play for voices’ Under Milk Wood; and stories and radio broadcasts such as “A Child’s Christmas in Wales” and “Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog.” He became widely popular in his lifetime and remained so after his premature death at the age of 39 in New York City. By then he had acquired a reputation, which he had encouraged, as a “roistering, drunken and doomed poet.”
May 23 Quote: Natalie Goldberg
“Write what disturbs you, what you fear, what you have not been willing to speak about. Be willing to be split open.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWg0BKVVhCo
Natalie Goldberg (born 1948) is an American popular author and speaker. She is best known for a series of books which explore writing as Zen practice. … Her 1986 book “Writing Down the Bones” sold over a million copies and is considered an influential work on the craft of writing. Her 2013 book, “The True Secret of Writing,” is a follow-up to that work.
May 22 Quote: Langston Hughes
“Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiwS1AgZNh4&feature=youtu.be
WIKI: James Mercer Langston Hughes (Feb. 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. He moved to New York City as a young man, where he made his career. One of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form called jazz poetry, Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance in New York City.
May 21 Quote: Jack London
“You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9OnShoLztA
WIKI: John Griffith London (Jan. 12, 1876 – Nov. 22, 1916) was an American novelist, journalist, and social activist. A pioneer in the world of commercial magazine fiction, he was one of the first writers to become a worldwide celebrity and earn a large fortune from writing. He was also an innovator in the genre that would later become known as science fiction.
May 20 Quote: Friedrich Nietzsche
“All I need is a sheet of paper and something to write with, and then I can turn the world upside down.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVEiboNgekI
WIKI: Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (Oct. 15, 1844 – Aug. 24, 1900) was a German philosopher, cultural critic, composer, poet, philologist, and Latin and Greek scholar whose work has exerted a profound influence on Western philosophy and modern intellectual history.
May 19 Quote: Charles Bukowski
“Some moments are nice, some are nicer, some are even worth writing about.”
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZGihEHMiHw
WIKI: Henry Charles Bukowski (Aug. 16, 1920 – March 9, 1994) was a German-American poet, novelist, and short story writer. His writing was influenced by the social, cultural, and economic ambiance of his home city of Los Angeles. His work addresses the ordinary lives of poor Americans, the act of writing, alcohol, relationships with women, and the drudgery of work.