
“For a writer, to change languages is to write a love letter with a dictionary.”
Anathemas and Admirations (1987)
Niven's Laws, Niven's Laws For Writers
“For a writer, to change languages is to write a love letter with a dictionary.”
Anathemas and Admirations (1987)
Preface to Lehrreicher Geschicht-Herold
Other Quotes
Kung Fu Grippe http://www.kungfugrippe.com/post/6004196999/like-hammers
Websites, The KungFu Grippe Tumblr website
“Real writers are those who want to write, need to write, have to write.”
Penguins and Golden Calves (2003)
Context: I have advice for people who want to write. I don't care whether they're 5 or 500. There are three things that are important: First, if you want to write, you need to keep an honest, unpublishable journal that nobody reads, nobody but you. Where you just put down what you think about life, what you think about things, what you think is fair and what you think is unfair. And second, you need to read. You can't be a writer if you're not a reader. It's the great writers who teach us how to write. The third thing is to write. Just write a little bit every day. Even if it's for only half an hour — write, write, write.
“A writer who writes straight is the architect of history.”
Introduction to 1932 Modern Library edition of Three Soldiers
Context: The mind of a generation is its speech. A writer makes aspects of that speech enduring by putting them in print. He whittles at the words and phrases of today and makes of them forms to set the mind of tomorrow's generation. That's history. A writer who writes straight is the architect of history.
“A writer should write what he has to say and not speak it.”
Nobel Prize Speech (1954)