Quotation of the Week: Emile Zola
“The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.”
–Emile Zola
(I do love Emile Zola.)
Source: @Quotes4Writers
Posts Tagged‘Quotation of the Week’
Quotation of the Week: William Maxwell (to Eudora Welty)
“If what I heard in your voice persists, will you drop everything and come to New York and settle down in the back room and let us hang garlands of love around your neck, day after day, until you are feeling yourself again?”
William Maxwell to Eudora Welty, in a letter dated January 24, 1967
If you subscribe to The Writer magazine you can read my review of What There Is to Say We Have Said: The Correspondence of Eudora Welty and William Maxwell (edited by Suzanne Marrs) in the July issue, which is out now. (If you’re not a subscriber, I’ll eventually share the review online.)
In the meantime, this week’s quotation is one of my favorite snippets, and it’s cited in the review. I love how it reveals the deep friendship between Maxwell and Welty and reminds us that, no matter how many examples of “bad behavior” we may hear about (or witness) in the lives of writers we admire, some authors really are as admirable off the page as on it.
Quotation of the Week: Tracy Seeley
Memoirists enter into an agreement with readers: I will tell you an emotionally true story in a skillful way. I will make it worth your while. And while my memory is imperfect, I haven’t invented memories. I haven’t invented facts. If I compress timelines, combine characters or conflate events, I will tell you. The other people in my book would tell the story differently; this is my own, true version.
–Tracy Seeley
Source: Jane Friedman’s There Are No Rules blog.
Quotation of the Week: Heather Sellers
“Writing a book is exactly like love…You give it everything you have. If it doesn’t work out, you’re heartbroken.”
–Heather Sellers
To which I add: But you get over it.
Eventually.
Usually.
Source: @Quotes4Writers
Quotation of the Week: Debbie Ridpath Ohi
“To sum up: Always ALWAYS read the fine print before entering a writing contest. And ask yourself: Is it worth entering?”
–Debbie Ridpath Ohi
Debbie Ridpath Ohi (as @inkyelbows) posted these words of wisdom on Twitter some time back, and I made a note to cite them here. Took me awhile, but better late than never!