I’ve done a post about quotes for writing and inspiration, but I’ve been collecting more writerly quotes, so I thought I’d share. Who doesn’t love a great quote about books, storytelling, and the passion we feel for the written word? Enjoy!

“A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.” Thomas Mann

“I love studying folklore and legends. The stories that people passed down for a thousand years without any sort of marketing support are obviously saying something appealing about the basic human condition.” Ti Schafer

“Words have weight, sound and appearance; it is only by considering these that you can write a sentence that is good to look at and good to listen to.” W. Somerset Maugham 

“Life can’t ever really defeat a writer who is in love with writing, for life itself is a writer’s lover until death – fascinating, cruel, lavish, warm, cold, treacherous, constant.” Edna Ferber 

“Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.” T.S. Eliot

“It is in our nature to explore, to reach out into the unknown. The only true failure would be not to explore at all.” Ernest Shackleton

“Writing is a kind of double living. The writer experiences everything twice. Once in reality and once in that mirror which waits always before or behind.” Catherina Drinker Bowen

“Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing and learn as you go.” E.L. Doctorow

“The great artists are those who impose their peculiar illusion on the rest of mankind.” Guy de Maupassant

“A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.” Richard Bach