“All you can write is what you see.”
Comment written on his first manuscript notes for "God Blessed America" (23 February 1940); quoted in Woody Guthrie: A Life (1981) by Joe Klein, p. 136
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Woody Guthrie 33
American singer-songwriter and folk musician 1912–1967Related quotes

“All writers write about the past, and I try to make it come alive so you can see what happened.”
In an interview with Religion & Ethics Newsweekly http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/2011/02/18/february-18-2011-ernest-gaines/8169/, February 18, 2011

“Write only if you cannot live without writing. Write only what you alone can write.”

"Thomas Love Peacock: The Novel of Ideas" (1980)
1980s, The Second American Revolution (1983)
Variant: In any case, write what you know will always be excellent advice to those who ought not to write at all.
Source: The Essential Gore Vidal

Speaking to the press following a "postively productive" meeting http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=50688 with Bill Clinton (24 October 1995)
Alternative translation: those anticipating a failure of the meeting "have failed" ("вы провалились").
1990s

“I've had a very sheltered life. What can happen to you if you stay home writing all day?”
“I don't see how you can write anything of value if you don't offend someone.”

A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext03/7cncd10.txt (1849), Thursday