Bret Stephens Quotes

I don't like writing - it's so difficult to say what you mean. It's much easier to edit other people's writing and help them say what they mean.

Writing is hard.

Writing is sometimes a balancing act between keeping things easily readable and being accurate.

Trying to get the sentences right and the structure of the narration right is about as big a job as I can handle. But I also know that if you handle that job properly, everything else just clicks into place.

Careful writing is important for many reasons, not least that intelligent but hurried reporters will trust the presser, resulting in a cascade of secondary damage.

I don't do much rewriting, because each paragraph is very carefully put together.

I spent the entire morning inserting a comma; I spent the whole afternoon removing it again.

There's a great deal of stripping away; in early drafts, I may say the same thing two or three times, and each may be appropriate, but I try to pick the best and improve it. I work on sound a great deal, and I will change a word or two, revise punctuation and line breaks, looking for the sound I want.

Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.

Be prepared to fall out of love with your words. I'm still too verbose at times.

I don't think music affects what words I choose to type in what order, within what punctuation, at this point, because I'm rereading and editing each sentence, at this point, in my published books, probably 100-150 times each, on average, and listening to probably 20-60 different songs in that time.

I have a problem with blogs - all the best writers benefit from edits.

I don't find writing easy. That is because I do take great care: I rewrite a lot. If anything is sort of clumsy and not possible to read aloud to oneself, which I think one should do... it doesn't work.

The beautiful part of writing is that you don't have to get it right the first time, unlike, say, a brain surgeon. You can always do it better, find the exact word, the apt phrase, the leaping simile.

If you get a sense that your writing isn't quite working, change it. Or cut it out. Don't just tell yourself it'll do, because it won't.

And that's how I start myself. I usually go back a couple of pages, maybe to the beginning of the chapter, and I start reading. And as I'm reading, I'm tweaking - putting in a different word, changing the syntax, putting that clause over there, you know that sort of thing.

I'm a fairly fast, but sloppy writer, so I'm a big fan of re-writing, and re-writing again.

I revise obsessively. It's important to me to have a clean page.

I write the paragraph, then I'm crossing out, changing words, trying to improve it. When it seems more or less OK, then I type it up because sometimes it's almost illegible, and if I wait, I might not be able to read it the next day.

My self-editing process is intense.

If I were to try to describe the way in which I write, the only word I would use without qualification is 'slowly.'

People might be surprised to know how much I throw away. For every page I publish, I throw 10 pages away.

I am a writer. Being critical is a writer's responsibility.

Most of my work consisted of crossing out. Crossing out was the secret of all good writing.

A good editor understands what you're talking and writing about and doesn't meddle too much.