Twelve Wise and Inspiring Quotes About Writing

December is always a big month for me: I love celebrating Christmas and the New Year, of course, but it’s also when my birthday falls (on December 12^th).

For me, this time of year always involves some reflection on how the past eleven and a bit months have gone … and some thoughts about what I want to accomplish in the year ahead.

All year, I’ve been sharing some of my favourite quotes about writing on Twitter … and I wanted to repost some of the best here, in the hopes that you’ll find them encouraging and motivating too:

#1: “Writing is a job, a talent, but it’s also the place to go in your head. It is the imaginary friend you drink your tea with in the afternoon.”
– Ann Patchett

#2: “Write about what really interests you, whether it is real things or imaginary things, and nothing else.”
– C. S. Lewis

#3: “Writing is the only thing that, when I do it, I don’t feel I should be doing something else.”
– Gloria Steinem

#4: “Serious writers write, inspired or not. Over time they discover that routine is a better friend than inspiration.”
– Ralph Keyes

#5: “The art of writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.”
– Mary Heaton Vorse

#6: “Take the time to write. You can do your life’s work in half an hour a day.”
– Robert Hass

#7: “We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.”
– Ernest Hemingway

#8: “I try to leave out the parts that people skip.”
– Elmore Leonard

#9: “I love my rejection slips, they show me I try.”
– Sylvia Plath

#10: “All good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere.”
– Anne Lamott

#11: “The scariest moment is always just before you start. After that, things can only get better.”
– Stephen King

#12: “If you write one story, it may be bad; if you write a hundred, you have the odds in your favor.”
– Edgar Rice Burroughs

If a particular quote appeals to you, why not write it out and keep it on your desk or in your writing notebook? (And if you have a different favourite quote, do share it with us in the comments!)