The war had made a man of him! It had coarsened him and hardened him. There was no other way to look at it. It had made him reach a point at which he would no longer stand unbearable things.
Ford Madox FordRead
The first thing you have to consider when writing a novel is your story, and then your story - and then your story!
Interpretation
What this quote means
The essence of novel writing lies in the story itself, prioritizing it above all else.
Ford Madox Ford emphasizes the fundamental importance of the story in novel writing. He underscores that a writer's primary focus must be the narrative they wish to convey, suggesting that the strength and quality of the story are paramount to the success of the novel. By repeating the phrase 'your story,' he highlights the singular focus and dedication needed in the craft of writing.
Themes
StoryNovelWritingNarrativeArt
In practice
Example use cases
In a writing workshop, one might say this quote to encourage fellow writers to focus on their narratives.
More from Ford Madox Ford
All quotes βMind, I am not preaching anything contrary to accepted morality. I am not advocating free love in this or any other case. Society must go on, I suppose, and society can only exist if the normal, if the virtuous, and the slightly deceitful flourish, and if the passionate, the headstrong, and the too-truthful are condemned to suicide and madness.
Ford Madox FordRead
There is no man who loves a woman that does not desire to come to her for the renewal of his courage, for the cutting asunder of his difficulties. And that will be the mainspring of his desire for her. We are all so afraid, we are all so alone, we all so need from the outside the assurance of our own worthiness to exist.
Ford Madox FordRead
You have to wait together - for a week, for a year, for a lifetime, before the final intimate conversation may be attained ... and exhausted. So that ... That in effect was love.
Ford Madox FordRead
Open the book to page ninety-nine and read, and the quality of the whole will be revealed to you.
Ford Madox FordRead
It is not merely that people must die and people must suffer, if not here, then there. But what is dreadful is that the world goes on and people go on being stupidly cruel - in the old ways and all the time.
Ford Madox FordRead
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This is the light of the mind, cold and planetary. The trees of the mind are black. The light is blue.
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