I like this. I'm telling it to all my writing students today who are of the belief that they can complete a beautiful dissertation in about twenty five minutes.

'What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.'
Dr. Johnson

Thanks for this quote! It inpires me so.
 

Yes, it's very relevant to anyone who writes.

I like this, it's very true and one to remember. Thanks for sharing.

Yes, and then ... no.

I know that some of my best-ever pieces of writing have more-or-less fallen out of my pen onto the page (or fingers onto the screen) - and I have lots of writer friends who've had similar experiences. The piece needed tidying, tweaking, fine-tuning, of course, but it was right in the essentials, from the moment it hit the page. To that extent, it was written without effort.

But it wasonly right at that point because it had had a long gestation before then: it was a story I'd been chewing on for months or years; or it was a late scene in a novel soI'd already discovered/imagined most of what I needed and I knew exactly where this scene was going; or a short I'd just spent two hours, solid, thinking it out and doing nothing else (much harder to get yourself to do than you'd think.)

So I guess in those latter cases the effort was there ... it just wasn't in the stages that a non-writer wouldn't recognise as "writing".

Emma, yes exactly- I take this from the quote too, the mental work./preparation/getting your mind in the right state or place. This is the writing stuff that looks like doing nothing, but is probably far more tiring than the actual writing down of words. Or that's how I feel after a proper session anyway.

Oh, and kind of linking is this fab quote I just re-tweeted: "It's one thing waiting for the muse but if you're at your desk then the muse knows where to find you." Anne Enright.

Yes, it's Elizabeth Gilbert's "Just show up to the page" thing.

And it was a well-known screenwriter (so well known I can't remember who it was) who was asked if he worked by the clock, or waited for the Muse, and he said "Yes, I wait for the Muse, and I make damn sure she arrives at 9am every morning."

Hi,
i love to read quotes and stories hope you'll this quote:

“Courage is like a muscle; it is strengthened by use.”

i would suggest you some inspirational stories , from the best of best stories website: eShortStories.com

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.<br />
- Harlan Ellison<br />