Tag Archives: writing

10 of My Favorite Quotes on Writing

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Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you’ve been to college. –Kurt Vonnegut

 

Write without pay until somebody offers pay. If nobody offers within three years, the candidate may look upon this circumstance with the most implicit confidence as the sign that sawing wood is what he was intended for. –Mark Twain

 

The faster you blurt, the more swiftly you write, the more honest you are.  –Ray Bradbury

 

Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip. –Elmore Leonard

 

The first draft of anything is shit.—Ernest Hemingway.

 

Omit needless words. –William Strunk

 

The only rule for writing I have is to leave it while I’m still hot… –William Faulkner

 

Whoever wants to tell a story of a sainted grandmother, unless you can find some old love letters, and get a new grandfather?  –Robert Penn Warren

 

When you write the thing through once, you find out what the end is. Then you can go back to the first chapter and put in a lot of those foreshadowings. –Flannery O’Connor

 

As far as I’m concerned the entire reason for becoming a writer is not having to get up in the morning.  –Neil Gaiman

6 Reasons This Site Isn’t Numeric Lists

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1.) Math was never my strong suit.

2.) I believe the transitive property is a conspiracy from the people who brought us the “moon-landing” and the “second law of thermodynamics.”

3.) I have a mild case of attention deficit disorder.

3.) I have a mild case of attention deficit disorder.

4.) Mom said, “If the people who use numeric lists jumped off a bridge, would you?”

5.) Vague David Letterman threat, “I didn’t get rich letting people steal my shit.” 

6.) Apparently, seven ate nine, making top 10 lists a mathematic impossibility.

2013: The Year of Post-Post-Apocalyptic Sci-fi

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If the sci-fi movies of 2013 reflect a zeitgeist, then we’re shifting from a people who think bad things await the Earth to a people who think we’ll have to abandon the planet altogether. That’s a prevailing theme in the upcoming big box-office movies of the genre. In <em>Oblivion</em>, Tom Cruise plays a drone repairman who at least believes himself to be one of the last people on the planet. In <em>After Earth</em>, Will Smith and his son (in character and real life) return to an Earth devoid of humanity. In <em>Elysium</em>, not everyone has left Earth, but everyone who is anyone has.

There are still a few of the traditional dystopian visions in which some dire fate confronts humanity on Earth. World War Z is a movie adaptation of Max Brooks’ novel that brought the Zombie back to life (admittedly bad pun intended.) It features Brad Pitt battling an ever expanding horde of “fast zombies.” Pacific Rim envisions giant alien monsters coming through a dimensional portal at the bottom of the ocean, and the giant robots humanity creates to battle them. The movie adaptation of Orson Scott Card’s novel Ender’s Game, while largely about the training of the genius Ender Wiggin, also imagines an Earth in peril from an alien threat. Even the new Star Trek movie at least partially abandons frolicking in deep space in favor of confronting an evil genius who threatens Earth.

Oblivion


Star Trek Into Darkness

After Earth


World War Z


Pacific Rim


Elysium


Ender’s Game