John Steinbeck

Here are 19 quotations from John Steinbeck, including writing advice, and some thoughts on literature and the writing life:
source

“Over the years I have written a great many stories and I still don’t know how to go about it except to write it and take my chances.”
(The Paris Review)

“The writer must believe that what he is doing is the most important thing in the world. And he must hold to this illusion even when he knows it is not true.”
(New York Times, 2 June 1969)

“The free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world.”
(East of Eden, 1952)

“If you are using dialogue—say it aloud as you write it. Only then will it have the sound of speech.”
(The Paris Review)

“I have come to believe that a great teacher is a great artist and that there are as few as there are any other great artists. It might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.”
(“…like captured fireflies,” 1955; also published in America and Americans and Selected Nonfiction, 2003)

“Beware of a scene that becomes too dear to you, dearer than the rest. It will usually be found that it is out of drawing.”
(The Paris Review)

“In utter loneliness a writer tries to explain the inexplicable.”
(New York Times, 2 June 1969)

“The discipline of the written word punishes both stupidity and dishonesty.”
(“In Awe of Words,” The Exonian, 75th anniversary edition, Exeter University, 1930)

“If a scene or a section gets the better of you and you still think you want it—bypass it and go on. When you have finished the whole you can come back to it and then you may find that the reason it gave trouble is because it didn’t belong there.”
(The Paris Review)

“I hold that a writer who does not passionately believe in the perfectibility of man has no dedication nor any membership in literature.”
(Speech at the Nobel Banquet at the City Hall in Stockholm, December 10, 1962)

“Time is the only critic without ambition.”
(The Paris Review)

“The profession of book writing makes horse racing seem like a solid, stable business.”
(Newsweek, 24 December 1962)

“Writers are a little below clowns and a little above trained seals.”
(Quote magazine, 18 June 1961)

“Forget your generalized audience. In the first place, the nameless, faceless audience will scare you to death and in the second place, unlike the theater, it doesn’t exist. In writing, your audience is one single reader. I have found that sometimes it helps to pick out one person—a real person you know, or an imagined person and write to that one.”
(The Paris Review)

“Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.”
(Interview with Robert van Gelder, 1947; quoted in John Steinbeck : A Biography, 1994)

“Write freely and as rapidly as possible and throw the whole thing on paper. Never correct or rewrite until the whole thing is down. Rewrite in process is usually found to be an excuse for not going on. It also interferes with flow and rhythm which can only come from a kind of unconscious association with the material.”
(The Paris Review)

“In every bit of honest writing in the world … there is a base theme. Try to understand men, if you understand each other you will be kind to each other. Knowing a man well never leads to hate and nearly always leads to love. There are shorter means, many of them. there is writing promoting social change, writing punishing injustice, writing in celebration of heroism, but always that base theme. Try to understand each other.”
(Journal entry, 1938; quoted in introduction to 1994 edition of Of Mice and Men)

“Boileau said that Kings, Gods and Heroes only were fit subjects for literature. The writer can only write about what he admires. Present-day kings aren’t very inspiring, the gods are on a vacation and about the only heroes left are the scientists and the poor … And since our race admires gallantry, the writer will deal with it where he finds it. He finds it in the struggling poor now.”
(Radio interview, 1939; quoted in introduction to 1992 edition of The Grapes of Wrath)

“Abandon the idea that you are ever going to finish. Lose track of the 400 pages and write just one page for each day, it helps. Then when it gets finished, you are always surprised.”
(The Paris Review)