Deborah Moggach Quotes

If you criticize what you’re doing too early you’ll never write the first line.

I feel I've got 10 books in me.

I started writing serious books so late because I knew I'd be accused of riding on my father's coattails.

I'm a 24-hour tweet machine, I'm a 24-hour blogger. When there's no pressure on me, I can talk and write and lecture with the best of them. But put a deadline on me and I start getting writer's block.

If you want to be a writer, just write. There's no magic to it.

A writer who isn't writing is asking for trouble.

I'd been very certain about not wanting to do the acting thing because of my father. I thought I'd always have the father-son thing of 'He got you the part.'

I had novels to write, so I wrote them.

I don't believe in writer's block. Think about it - when you were blocked in college and had to write a paper, didn't it always manage to fix itself the night before the paper was due? Writer's block is having too much time on your hands.

I've never had writer's block.

Yes, I mean, I can't match up to my mother's acting skills, actually both my parents. I just cannot match up to them. My mother was such a powerful and a respectable performer. They are actually overshadowing me and yes, I cannot be as good as them.

My dad is a Ghanaian immigrant, and he wanted a son who was an engineer.

That 'writers write' is meant to be self-evident. People like to say it. I find it is hardly ever true. Writers drink. Writers rant. Writers phone. Writers sleep. I have met very few writers who write at all.

I've written five books, a book every three years. I'm fairly lazy and it doesn't take that much...people who are not lazy are Isaac Asimov.

It is better to write a bad first draft than to write no first draft at all.

On the whole, anything that gets you writing and keeps you writing is a good thing. Anything that stops you writing is a bad thing.

If you want to be a writer, I have two pieces of advice. One is to be a reader. I think that's one of the most important parts of learning to write. The other piece of advice is 'Just do it!' Don't think about it, don't agonize, sit down and write.

Sometimes I don't write at all. Someone once asked me, "What do you do when you're not writing?" And I said, "I idle."

Sinclair Lewis was asked one time to give a talk to class of students about writing. When he got there he asked the class, Do you people want to be writers?and they all said yes. Then Lewis said, Why the hell aren't you at home writing?

It takes an awful lot of time to not write a book.

I want to do something splendid… Something heroic or wonderful that won’t be forgotten after I’m dead… I think I shall write books.

Do not beat up on yourself. Do not criticize your writing as lousy, inadequate, stupid, or any of the evil epithets that you are used to heaping on yourself. Such self-bashing is never useful. If you indulge in it, your writing doesn't stand a chance. So when your mind turns on you, turn it back, stamp it down, shut it up, and keep writing.

Better to write twaddle, anything, than nothing at all.

Who here wants to be a writer?' I asked. Everyone in the room raised his hand. 'Why the hell aren't you home writing?' I said, and left the stage.

Maybe it goes without saying that if you want to become a famous writer before you’re dead, you’ll have to write something. But the folks in my classes with the biggest ideas and the best publicity shots ready to grace the back covers of their best-selling novels are also usually the ones who aren’t holding any paper.