A Quote by J. R. R. Tolkien

They say it is the first step that costs the effort. I do not find it so. I am sure I could write unlimited 'first chapters'. I have indeed written many. — © J. R. R. Tolkien
They say it is the first step that costs the effort. I do not find it so. I am sure I could write unlimited 'first chapters'. I have indeed written many.
How many chapters have been written about love verses - and how many more might be written! - might, would, could, should, or ought to be written! - I will venture to say, will be written!
Many first-time novelists end up rewriting their first two or three chapters, trying to get them 'just right.' But the point of the first draft is not to get it right; it's to get it written - so that you'll have something to work with.
If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realize that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means that you are very conceited indeed.
Find an organization, shoot them an email, call them up, find them on Facebook and say "Hey, I want to volunteer." And that first step could lead to a whole life of engagement. It could be a pretty exciting ride.
Well, first you have to love writing. A lot of authors love having written. But I enjoy the actual writing. Beside that, I think the main reason I can be so prolific is the huge amount of planning I do before I start to write. I do a very complete, chapter-by-chapter outline of every book I write. When I sit down to write, I already know everything that's going to happen in the book. This means I've done all the important thinking, and I can relax and enjoy the writing. I could never write so many books if I didn't outline them first.
All great masters are chiefly distinguished by the power of adding a second, a third, and perhaps a fourth step in a continuous line. Many a man has taken the first step. With every additional step you enhance immensely the value of your first.
Many a man had taken the first step. With every additional step you enhance immensely the value of your first.
Marriage is a book of which the first chapter is written in poetry and the remaining chapters in prose.
Marriage - a book of which the first chapter is written in poetry and the remaining chapters in prose.
Anybody can find out if he is a writer. If he were a writer, when he tried to write of some particular day, he would find in the effort that he could recall exactly how the light fell and how the temperature felt, and all the quality of it. Most people cannot do it. If they can do it, they may never be successful in a pecuniary sense, but that ability is at the bottom of writing, I am sure.
Ideas come at any moment -- except when you demand them. Most ideas come while I'm physically active, at the gym, with friends, gardening, so I always carry pen and paper. My first draft is always written in longhand. But once the first dozen chapters, more like short stories, are written, then momentum builds until I can't leave the project until it's done.
If at the end of your first ten or fifteen years of fighting and working and feeling, you find you've written one line of one poem, you'll be very lucky indeed.
I am sure of this: that no one can write a book which children will like unless he write it for himself first.
I do write, but for now I am keeping it all in the desk drawer. I have always written. The only book that I have published was "Revolution," during the election campaign, a book that contains both personal and political chapters. I have never been happy with what I have written, including three novels that, from my point of view, are incomplete.
Thoughts are created in the act of writing. [It is a myth that] you must have something to say in order to write. Reality: You often need to write in order to have anything to say. Thought comes with writing, and writing may never come if it is postponed until we are satisfied that we have something to say...The assertion of write first, see what you had to say later applies to all manifestations of written language, to letters...as well as to diaries and journals
In a small affair or in a big affair, first consult yourself and find out if there is any conflict in your own being about anything you want to do. And when you find no conflict there, then feel sure that a path is already made for you. You have but to open your eyes and take a step forward, and the other step will be led by God.
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