“There is no left and right in writing. There is only good and bad
writing.”
Ernest Hemingway, Letter to Paul Romaine, 1932, Selected Letters,
- 363
“In truly good writing no matter how many times you read it you
do not know how it is done. That is because there is a mystery in all great
writing and that mystery does not dissect out. It continues and it is always
valid. Each time you re-read you see or learn something new.”
Ernest Hemingway, 1952, Selected Letters, p. 770
“…sometimes when I was starting a new story and I could not get it
going, I would … look out over the roofs of Paris and think, ‘Do not worry.
You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do
is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.’ So finally
I would write one true sentence, and then go from there… I found that I could
cut that scrollwork or ornament out and throw it away and start with the first
true simple declarative sentence I had written.”
Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast, p. 12
“If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.”
Elmore Leonard, 10 Rules of Writing, p. 71
“Don’t go into great detail describing places and things. Unless
You’re Margaret Atwood and can paint scenes with language or write
landscapes in the style of Jim Harrison. But even if you’re good at it,
you don’t want descriptions that bring the action, the flow of the story,
to a standstill.”
Elmore Leonard, 10 Rules of Writing, p. 54-55