A Quote by Thomas Mann

The task of a writer consists of being able to make something out of an idea.

Thomas Mann

Quote Topics

Able Being Consists Idea Make Out Something Task Writer

Quote Author

Thomas Mann
German - Novelist
June 6, 1875 - August 12, 1955

The first is that good writing consists of mastering the fundamentals (vocabulary, grammar, the elements of style) and then filling the third level of your toolbox with the right instruments. The second is that while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one

Stephen King

What makes a good animated movie is being able to balance adult and knowing in-jokes and also just out and out funny things that make all people laugh. The idea that it's actually something that will appeal to a family, that's the trick.

Benedict Cumberbatch

Many times, what people call 'writer's block' is the confusion that happens when a writer has a great idea, but their writing skill is not up to the task of putting that idea down on paper. I think that learning the craft of writing is critical.

Pearl Cleage

Everybody has to share something. This is one of the most important laws of the human condition, is the necessity to share. This is the task of the writer - but not only of a writer, of every human being - it is to share something that he or she has.

Paulo Coelho

I think the idea of being on stage and playing for people, and being able to inject a little bit of joy into their lives is a really exciting concept for me. That's definitely why I make music. It's never been for any kind of materialistic reasons, so that thought of being able to be up on stage, and being able to give something to someone in a moment of need for them - that gets me up in the morning; that really excites me.

Kimbra

There's nothing confessional about crafting and shaping a story out of a lived life. In fact, it's quite the opposite - the writer has to be able to transcend the life, to see it as if standing outside of it, in order to be able to make something of it. There's something enormously satisfying and gratifying about crafting something, taking all that chaos and giving it shape.

Dani Shapiro

I like the idea of being able to fight my way out of something.

Nick Diaz

Nothing in the whole world felt as good as being able to make something from a sudden idea.

Beverly Cleary

To make your life being a writer, it's an auto-slavery ... you are both the slave and the task-master.

Susan Sontag

When you decide 'to be a writer,' you don't have the faintest idea of what the work is like. When you begin, you write spontaneously out of your limited experience of both the unwritten world and the written world. You're full of naïve exuberance. 'I am a writer!' Rather like the excitement of 'I have a lover!' But working at it nearly every day for fifty years ? whether it is being the writer or being the lover ? turns out to be an extremely taxing job and hardly the pleasantest of human activities.

Philip Roth

Wisdom consists in being able to distinguish among dangers and make a choice of the least harmful.

Niccolo Machiavelli

Not being active, your name doesn't go out there as much, and you lose the popularity thing. Also, you're not able to make a living. This is what we do to make a living: we go out there and fight. Not being able to fight for a year and a half and not able to bring in money, it definitely sets you back.

Cain Velasquez

My bar for being successful is being able to do movies that really mean something to me and being able to make a living off of that.

Channing Tatum

Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men.

Joseph Conrad

It is easier for the reader to judge, by a thousand times, than for the writer to invent. The writer must summon his Idea out of nowhere, and his characters out of nothing, and catch words as they fly, and nail them to the page. The reader has something to go by and somewhere to start from, given to him freely and with great generosity by the writer. And still the reader feels free to find fault.