Two very simple rules: _x000D_ A. You don't have to write. _x000D_ B. You can't do anything else _x000D_ The rest comes of itself.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of commitment to writing, suggesting that if you don't write, you will not achieve anything.
Raymond Chandler's quote highlights the duality of writing; one must dedicate themselves fully to the act of writing while also accepting that the writing process itself can be liberating and self-guiding. By stating that you don't have to write while simultaneously reinforcing that doing nothing else leads to a lack of progress, Chandler speaks to the necessity of balancing discipline and freedom in the creative process.
In practice
In a writing workshop, to motivate participants to put pen to paper.
Undoubtedly the stories about them [hard-boiled detectives] had a fantastic element. Such things happened, but not so rapidly, nor to so close-knit a group of people, nor within so narrow a frame of logic. This was inevitable because the demand was for constant action; if you stopped to think you were lost. When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand.
There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.
Organized crime is the dirty side of the sharp dollar.
When in doubt, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand.
The flood of print has turned reading into a process of gulping rather than savoring.
If my books had been any worse, I should not have been invited to Hollywood, and if they had been any better, I should not have come.
Both old and young alike ought to seek wisdom: the former in order that, as age comes over him, he may be young in good things because of the grace of what has been, and the latter in order that, while he is young, he may at the same time be old, because he has no fear of the things which are to come.
The best of ideas is hurt by uncritical acceptance and thrives on critical examination.
Nothing doth more hurt in a state than that cunning men pass for wise.
A man who fears suffering is already suffering from what he fears.
And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge like a sinking star, Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
If there were no night, we would not appreciate the day, nor could we see the stars and the vastness of the heavens. We must partake of the bitter with the sweet. There is a divine purpose in the adversities we encounter every day. They prepare, they purge, they purify, and thus they bless.
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