A Quote by Douglas Adams

There's nothing worse than sitting down to write a novel and saying, "Well, okay, I'm going to do something of high artistic worth." It's funny.

Douglas Adams

Quote Topics

Artistic Down Funny Going High High Art Nothing Novel Okay Saying Sitting Sitting Down Something Than Well Worse Worth Write

Quote Author

Douglas Adams
English - Writer
March 11, 1952 - May 11, 2001

There's nothing worse than sitting down to write a novel and saying, 'Well, okay, I'm going to do something of high artistic worth.'

Douglas Adams

There's always a source for humor [in politics]. If it's inappropriate to write about, if there's nothing funny about it, then it's not funny. So it sort of selects itself. It has to. And plus, often something that wouldn't be funny at the time is okay to make jokes about later.

Calvin Trillin

Prowling about the rooms, sitting down, getting up, stirring the fire, looking out the window, teasing my hair, sitting down to write, writing nothing, writing something and tearing it up...

Charles Dickens

It's been a while since I've written a novel aimed at the adult market, but I never sit down and say to myself, 'Okay, now I'm going to write something for us old folks.' I get gripped by an idea, and I go where the idea takes me.

Rick Yancey

How's it going down there?" "It's weird. They're too polite, they talk funny, and stuff has too much shine on it. But the coffee's worse than Central's, so that's something.

Nora Roberts

I do feel like I'm in this lucky position where I can write something and people will read it, and I feel like I should say something that's probably worth saying... I feel like it's something worth saying, and one more person saying it is better.

David Liss

Most people are much better at saying things in letters than in conversation, and some people can write artistic, inventive letters, but when they try a poem or story or novel they become pretentious.

Charles Bukowski

Nothing is worse for me, as an actor, than when I walk on a set and the director goes, "Okay, you're going to be standing here, the other person is going to be standing here, and you're going to move to there and then do the scene." That doesn't help actors.

Eric Balfour

Before I tell you, I have to know three things," I said. "Okay." "One, are you sitting down?" "Yes." "Two, are you mentally stable?" "More than you'll ever be." Well, that was uncalled for. "And three, how do you spell schizophrenia?" "What does that have to do with anything?" "Nothing. I just wanted to see if you'd tell me.

Darynda Jones

When you get ready to write your novel, outline it first. There's nothing worse than getting halfway through and realizing you've painted yourself in a plot corner.

Janet Evanovich

Like lots of people who say, 'I'm going to write a novel,' it's actually more comfortable to think I could write a novel than to discover that you can't.

Hugh Grant

Why do I like to write short stories? Well, I certainly didn't intend to. I was going to write a novel. And still! I still come up with ideas for novels. And I even start novels. But something happens to them. They break up. I look at what I really want to do with the material, and it never turns out to be a novel.

Alice Munro

If I sit down to write a young-adult novel, then I'm going to write either to the punch-pulling expectation of what I can't do, or I'm going to go the other way and think about what can I sneak in to be 'down with the kids' - which would be excruciating.

Patrick Ness

I think the audience should take away that it's okay to be smart, it's okay to be funny and well-learned. You can be from academia and be funny; you don't have to be an idiot.

Godfrey

They [candidates] say, "I don't want to say anything controversial." And so nobody covers them. Then they blame the journalists, saying "Why don't they write down what I said?" In congressional races, 90 percent of the time the answer is, "Because you are boring and you don't have anything that makes me interested in listening to you. Why the heck should somebody write it down? There's nothing here worth hearing."