the art of writing
advice from writers, and more on writing
Brie Wolfson and
the art of writing
Brie Wolfson and
Grace Lin: She asks, Where do you get your ideas?... See more
Mo Willems: Well, Leah, that's a very good question and I'm afraid you may not like the answer because ideas are not things you get. People tend to think that ideas are things like diamonds. And then you go out and you get them and you grab them and you bring them back. But that's not what ideas are.
From George Saunders, on nuance and embracing complexity:
... See morethe writer doesn't have to have a fixed firm idea, but has to be able to take the reader on a journey to remind her that the world is complicated. From the very beginning, I understood writing to be about some kind of moral or ethical imperative. Absent that, I'm not that interested in it,
“The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.”
—Terry Pratchett