The most important thing in writing is to have written. I can always fix a bad page. I can't fix a blank one.
Interpretation
The essence of writing is to produce text, regardless of its initial quality.
This quote emphasizes the importance of creating written content without fear of imperfection. Nora Roberts suggests that having something down on the page is invaluable because it can be edited and improved later, while a blank page offers no opportunity for creativity or progress.
In practice
Motivating aspiring writers in a workshop.
The most important thing is you can't write what you wouldn't read for pleasure. It's a mistake to analyze the market thinking you can write whatever is hot. You can't say you're going to write romance when you don't even like it. You need to write what you would read if you expect anybody else to read it.
You're the love of my life. I don't care how corny that sounds. You're the start of it, and the end of it. And you're the best of it.
Magic exists. Who can doubt it, when there are rainbows and wildflowers, the music of the wind and the silence of the stars? Anyone who has loved has been touched by magic. It is such a simple and such an extraordinary part of the lives we live.
Why couldn't she have this, just enjoy this, without creating obstacles, digging up problems, worrying about mistakes, about tomorrow's? Why let the maybe's, the what if's, the probabilities spoil something so lovely?
She raised her eyes to his. They had both come from misery, she thought, and survived it. They had been drawn together through violence and tragedy, and had overcome it. They walked different paths and had found a mutual route. Some things last, she thought. Some ordinary things. Like love.
Happily ever after?" "If justice doesn't triumph and love doesn't make the circle in entertainment fiction, what's the point? Real life sucks too often.
All I ask is that you do as well as you can, and remember that, while to write adverbs is human, to write he said or she said is divine.
When I'm working on a book, I constantly retype my own sentences. Every day I go back to page one and just retype what I have. It gets me into a rhythm.
I don't write for catharsis; I have to write to understand.
Write the best book you can, the one that demands to be written, no matter what genre it is. Even a trend the trades tell you has gone stale can be revitalized by a superb piece of writing. It'll never be revitalized by someone jumping on a trend bandwagon.
I'm not a very good writer, but I'm an excellent rewriter.
One of the really bad things you can do to your writing is to dress up the vocabulary, looking for long words because you're maybe a little bit ashamed of your short ones. This is like dressing up a household pet in evening clothes. The pet is embarrassed and the person who committed this act of premeditated cuteness should be even more embarrassed.
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