Quotes & Sayings About Humorous Writing

Forgive my asking you to use your mind. It is a thing which no novelist should expect of his reader ... — Owen Wister

An idea is a gift, a finished project is turning that gift into a book by making yourself write even when you don't want to. There is no such thing as a block of time to write. You have to carve time from a busy day. Elaine L. Orr — Elaine Orr

I really like the Observer. I think I'd love to have a column with a broad reach that would enable me to do some proper reporting, but keep it on sort of a humorous level. I've always had a very happy experience writing for them. — Toby Young

The problem with taxation is that authors can't write off whiskey as a business expense. — Bryan Way

I refuse to give readers an uplifting faux experience engineered to comfort them and perpetuate the sociopolitical and economic status quo."
"Who died and made you Bertolt Brecht? — Chuck Palahniuk

Writing is my passion, not my job. I need to write as much as I need to breathe, if not more. — A.E. Croft

Some of the best fiction writers got their start writing airline menus. — Erma Bombeck

What does it take to be a writer? 1) Foolhardily believing that someone might actually be interested in reading what you've written. 2) Spending an enormous amount of time writing it as well as you can. 3) Accepting that, at best, you'll probably be paid something around 25 cents an hour for your efforts. — Todd Strasser

Stalin didn't write any memoirs. He was too secretive. He was afraid people might read them. — Jonathan Lynn

The night before a deadline, I usually am in desperate need of a back rub. And new wrists. And candy. And little mice to secretly finish the job while I am sleeping. — Christy Hall

Unless you're writing for a humorous effect, elves or space aliens and all creatures who aren't human should at least be as strange as, oh, the French. — Will Shetterly

When I was a kid, I just read and read. We were lucky enough to have gone to England and had a whole bunch of Penguin Puffins books, like The Land of Green Ginger by Noel Langley, which is hilarious. I would love to be able to write a book like that, but I don't know that I have a humorous bone in my body when it comes to writing. Once on a Time by A.A. Milne. I read a lot of old, old fantasy stuff. The Carbonelbooks by Barbara Sleigh. Then when I got a little older I loved Zilpha Keatley Snyder. I was a big fan of romance and when I got a little bit older I would read a Harlequin romance or a Georgette Heyer novel and then David Copperfield, and then another genre book and then Irving Stone's The Agony and the Ecstasy. I was that kind of reader. One book that I loved was I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith. I loved voice and that book had it in spades. And then of course I grew into loving Jane Eyre. — Franny Billingsley

The confusion inherent in the word comics has been apparent to those writing in the filed for years. The word has a plural form but is singular in application. And in its singular form, comic, it can be an adjective for something humorous or another name for a comedian. In short, comics lacks the precision it ought to have for ordinary communication let alone serious philosophical deliberations. — Robert C. Harvey

You'll have to excuse Kyle; he's somewhat of a history geek and gets himself all excited. He talks without thinking sometimes," Collin said punching his arm. "But, he is well informed about our situation. He knows details about things that I don't."
"What does he know exactly?"
"Kyle said the book dates a long way back."
I tilted my head. "You mean the book I've been writing in?" Collin nodded. "How does he know this?"
"I love this," Kyle interrupted. "I'm in the car right? You guys can see me? — Nicole Gulla

Writing something new is an effective way to get rid of writer's block. Or you can observe the people around you and fantasize like I do. — B.A. Gabrielle

Write. Write write write write WRITE. Write. Now.

(This is an inspirational writing quote.) — Jen Lynn Anderson

Don't stop writing until someone pries the pen from your cold, dead hands. — James John Tritten

Humorous writing is often thought of as substandard in comparison to work with a more dramatic or tragic intent. I don't know what to say to this except that I disagree wholeheartedly. — Patrick DeWitt

The important thing for any writer to remember is to take the writing seriously, but not the writer. — A.E. Poynor

"Write that down," the King said to the jury, and the jury eagerly wrote down all three dates on their slates, and then added them up, and reduced the answer to shillings and pence. — Lewis Carroll

Occupation: Writer
Occupational Hazard: Carpel tunnel
Solution: Wrist guards to bed or my hands do all the sleeping
Perspective: I've decided my wrist guards have turned me into a Ninja Superhero that hides in the shadows — Christy Hall

Clearly, we're supposed to be together. If this were the internet, seventeen-year-old girls would be writing slash fiction about us as we speak. — Vaughn R. Demont

Writing a book with completely fictitious characters is like running a democracy, centered around a capital state. You constantly live with the fear & suspicion that one of the characters will start an uncontrollable rebellion. — Shomprakash Sinha Roy

American radio is the reverse of the Shakespearean stage. In Shakespeare's time the world's greatest dramas were acted with the most primitive technical arrangements; on the American air the world's most primitive writing is performed under perfect technical conditions. — George Mikes

There is little more I can add short of dissecting the man, or going into intimate details such as the modest proportions and slight southeasterly curvature of his manhood. — Felix J. Palma

One of the things I love about labeling myself as an author is that I can read books and call it "researching writing styles."
Mike Mankoff — Mike Mankoff

I write for kids because I think the most interesting (and most humorous) stories come from people's childhoods. When I was writing 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid,' I had a blast talking on the phone to my younger brother, Patrick, remembering all of the things that happened to our family when we were growing up. — Jeff Kinney

But, you say, there is very little conversation in this book. Why isn't there more dialoge? What we want in a book by this citizen is people talking; that is all he knows how to do and now he doesn't do it. The fellow is no philosopher, no savant, an incompetent zoologist, he drinks too much and cannot punctuate readily and now he has stopped writing dialogue. Some one ought to put a stop to him. He is bull crazy. — Ernest Hemingway,

Discipline allows magic. To be a writer is to be the very best of assassins. You do not sit down and write every day to force the Muse to show up. You get into the habit of writing every day so that when she shows up, you have the maximum chance of catching her, bashing her on the head, and squeezing every last drop out of that bitch. — Lili St. Crow

I'm writing a new book called 'Ventroliquism for Dummies'. — Ron Moore

Gilbert would never have dreamed of writing a sonnet to her eyebrows. But then, Gilbert could see a joke. She had once told Roy a funny story - and he had not seen the point of it. She recalled the chummy laugh she and Gilbert had had together over it, and wondered uneasily if life with a man who had no sense of humor might not be somewhat uninteresting in the long run. But who could expect a melancholy, inscrutable hero to see the humorous side of things? It would be flatly unreasonable. — L.M. Montgomery

I talk about any number of things on my Facebook space. Politics. Current events. The writing life. The latest tempests in a teapot centering on fandom. Daily doings from my own life. My cats, for crying out loud. Flights of humorous fantasy. Books, both those I've read and those I've written. Movies. And occasionally, TV shows. — Adam-Troy Castro

I'm writing a book on Procrastination. I hope to start it tomorrow. I've been thinking about it for almost six years now. — Ron Moore

Michael Palin : "I am sorry to interrupt you there Dennis, but he's crossed it out. Thomas Hardy here on the first day of his new novel has crossed out the only word he has written so far and he is gazing off into space. Ohh! Oh dear he's signed his name again."
Graham Chapman: "It looks like Tess of the D'Urbervilles all over again."
- Matching Tie and Handkerchief, "Novel Writing — Graham Chapman

A writing day is like any other day. Except I live in my pajamas, I forget to eat, and I suddenly look up, wondering when day turned into night. — Christy Hall

Q: Best part about being a musical theatre book writer?
A: Explaining what that is. — Christy Hall

When I started writing this, I found that I simply couldn't take fantasy seriously, so it became humorous, and continued from there. — Piers Anthony

Keep rechewing. Like a cow. Use all your creative stomachs. — Elizabeth M. Lawrence

While I would agree that I write about serious subjects, and that they're not necessarily the most pleasant subjects or even the most pleasant people, as a writer I just think about the humorous aspects of these things - that's what keeps me going when I'm writing a story. — Ann Beattie

If a book falls in the woods and nobody read it, was it ever written? — Neil Leckman

Why do I write? Because I like telling stories and I don't like repeating myself (insert chuckle here). — Najeev Raj Nadarajah

Thought for the day: Twitter ... 140 character limit ... must be a great tool for fortune cookie writers ... — E.A. Bucchianeri

There's nothing sexier than imaging myself as an Oxford comma getting unambiguously banged. Throw in a semicolon in between two closely related independent clauses, and a volcanic love of punctuation eruption is guaranteed. — Ella Dominguez

Part of my soul goes into each quote I write. A book of my quotes can be yours for just $19.99. — Ryan Lilly

Much of writing might be described as mental pregnancy with successive difficult deliveries. J.B. PRIESTLEY — Janice Lane Palko

Writing is a wonderful way to spend the day. Particularly when the alternative is housework! — J. Mary Masters

Writing is a lonely pursuit. The only thing working is imagination and hands.
The only difference between writing and masturbation is one is presumably intended for a mass audience. — Mark Bell

I had to be the world's biggest loser, writing about hair, and stuff about my body. No wonder I stopped keeping a journal. It was like keeping a record of my own stupidity. Why would I want to do that? — Benjamin Alire Saenz

It's a good thing, right, when an author gets turned on by the dirty scenes they write?! — Martha Sweeney