Halloween is a day old. InkTober has officially ended. So what’s up next? Hint: The world needs your novel. Yes! It’s NaNoWriMo, my dear. That’s short for National Novel Writing Month. November 1st to 30th is the time of the year when we let loose our writer’s self to binge on writing. So what do you do on NaNoWriMo? Write 50,000 words in 30 days – that’s the goal. Why this writing challenge matters? Have you been thinking of writing your novel? Do you have story ideas lingering around your head for couple of years now? Then don’t waste anymore time. Join NaNoWriMo.
To jump-start your #BingeWriting days, here are 15 quotes to warm you up for the days ahead.
1. What’s your untold story?
There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you.
Maya Angelou
2. What hell street is like to writers
The road to hell is paved with works-in-progress.
Philip Roth
3. … In which the King contemplates
I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs, and I will shout it from the rooftops.
Stephen King
4. No rules
There are no laws for the novel. There never have been, nor can there ever be.
Doris Lessing
5. As Nike slogan says: Just do it
I do not over-intellectualize the production process. I try to keep it simple: Tell the damned story.
Tom Clancy
6. Disclaimer: No children were harm in the process
When your story is ready for rewrite, cut it to the bone. Get rid of every ounce of excess fat. This is going to hurt; revising a story down to the bare essentials is always a little like murdering children, but it must be done.
Stephen King
7. And of course a dose of caffeine!
I don’t need an alarm clock. My ideas wake me.
Ray Bradbury
8. Voracious readers are better writers
Just write every day of your life. Read intensely. Then see what happens. Most of my friends who are put on that diet have very pleasant careers.
Ray Bradbury
9. Now you know the importance of keeping a journal within arm’s reach
Write while the heat is in you. … The writer who postpones the recording of his thoughts uses an iron which has cooled to burn a hole with.
Henry David Thoreau
10. Ditch the highfalutin words
Some writers have enormous vocabularies; these are the folks who’d know if there really is such a thing as an insalubrious dithyramb or a cozening raconteur… other writers use smaller, simpler vocabularies… Remember that the basic rule of vocabulary is use the first word that comes to your mind, if it is appropriate and colorful.
Stephen King
11. Writing is hard work
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.
Harlan Ellison
12. Follow your intense obsessions
Don’t bend; don’t water it down; don’t try to make it logical; don’t edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly.
Anne Rice
13. On getting started
The secret to getting ahead is getting started.
Agatha Christie
14. Your version of a story
That’s why I write, because life never works except in retrospect. You can’t control life, at least you can control your version.
Chuck Palahniuk
15. Because you are unique
Start telling the stories that only you can tell, because there’ll always be better writers than you and there’ll always be smarter writers than you. There will always be people who are much better at doing this or doing that, but you are the only you.
Neil Gaiman
SOURCES:
72 of the Best Quotes About Writing | By: Zachary Petit | June 22, 2012 | http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/72-of-the-best-quotes-about-writing
Why Stephen King’s Road To Hell Is Paved With Adverbs | By Meg Miller for Off the Shelf | http://www.huffingtonpost.com/off-the-shelf-/why-stephen-kings-road-to_b_6109212.html