Memo to The New Yorker (1959); reprinted in New York Times Book Review (4 December 1988)
Letters and interviews
“You cannot teach creativity—how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be.” Mario Vargas Llosa”
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Mario Vargas Llosa 30
Peruvian writer, politician, journalist, and essayist 1936Related quotes
“You become a writer because you need to become a writer - nothing else.”
“If you need drugs to be a good writer, you're not a good writer.”
The Rod Serling bio page on the Internet Movie DataBase.
Other
“You become a good writer just as you become a good joiner: by planing down your sentences.”
On devient bon écrivain comme on devient bon menuisier: en rabotant ses phrases.
As quoted in Anatole France en pantoufles by Jean-Jacques Brousson (1924); published in English as Anatole France Himself: A Boswellian Record by His Secretary, Jean-Jacques Brousson (1925), trans. John Pollock, p. 85
Variant translation: You become a good writer just as you become a good carpenter: by planing down your sentences.
“If you would be a good reader, read; if a writer, write.”
Book II, ch. 18.
Discourses
"Quotes", The Educated Imagination (1963), Talk 2: The Singing School
Interview with J D McCarthy 'The Art of Poetry' no 35 Fall 1985
“You cannot teach a man anything, you can only help him to find it within himself.”
As quoted in How to Win Friends and Influence People (1935) by Dale Carnegie, p. 117; also paraphrased as "You cannot teach a man anything, you can only help him to find it for himself." Attributions are found as early as 1882.
Attributed
Source: Google Books link https://books.google.com/books?id=h70_AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA476&dq=You+cannot+teach+a+man+anything;+you+can+only+help+him+find+it+within+himself&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAGoVChMI39Gmss_gyAIVRNRjCh1Q2wGN#v=onepage&q=%22You%20cannot%20teach%22&f=false
“A writer must teach himself that the basest of all things is to be afraid.”