9780679763413

InAdvice to Writers, Jon Winokur, author of the bestsellingThe Portable Curmudgeon, gathers the counsel of more than four hundred celebrated authors in a treasury on the world of writing. Here are literary lions on everything from the passive voice to promotion and publicity: James Baldwin on the practiced illusion of effortless prose, Isaac Asimov on the despotic tendencies of editors, John Cheever on the perils of drink, Ivan Turgenev on matrimony and the Muse. Here, too, are the secrets behind the sleight-of-hand practiced by artists from Aristotle to Rita Mae Brown. Sagacious, inspiring, and entertaining,Advice to Writersis an essential volume for the writer in every reader.

Jon Winokur is the author of a dozen books, including <b>The Portable Curmudgeon</b> and <b>The Rich Are Different</b>. He lives in Pacific Palisades, California.

Acknowledgments

vii

Introduction

ix

Author's Note

xi

Agents

3

(3)

Characters

6

(7)

Colleagues

13

(3)

Critics and Criticism

16

(4)

Dialogue

20

(3)

Discouragement

23

(7)

Drink

30

(3)

Editors and Editing

33

(11)

Encouragement

44

(13)

Genres

57

(17)

Grammar and Usage

74

(8)

Material

82

(5)

Money

87

(3)

Occupational Hazards

90

(4)

Plagiarism

94

(2)

Plot

96

(3)

Prizes

99

(3)

Process

102

(8)

Publicity and Promotion

110

(6)

Publishers and Publishing

116

(4)

Punctuation

120

(3)

Qualifications and Requirements

123

(10)

The Reader

133

(6)

Reading

139

(5)

Rules and Commandments

144

(5)

The Secret

149

(7)

Style

156

(6)

Success and Failure

162

(3)

Technique

165

(3)

Tricks of the Trade

168

(8)

Why You Write

176

(3)

Words

179

(7)

Work Habits

186

(4)

Writer's Block

190

(9)

The Writer's Life

199

(3)

Writing Advice

202

(5)

Selected Bibliography

207

(5)

Permissions Acknowledgments

212

(1)

Index

213

What is included with this book?

The New copy of this book will include any supplemental materials advertised. Please check the title of the book to determine if it should include any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.

The Used, Rental and eBook copies of this book are not guaranteed to include any supplemental materials. Typically, only the book itself is included. This is true even if the title states it includes any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.

On agents: "Choose your agent as carefully as you would choose your accountant or lawyer. Or dentist." -- Russell Banks

On characters: "The characters have their own lives and their own logic, and you have to act accordingly." -- Isaac Bashevis Singer

On colleagues: "Artists never thrive in colonies. Ants do. What the budding artist needs is the privilege of wrestling with his problems in solitude -- and now and the a piece of red meat." -- Henry Miller

On critics and criticism: "It is advantageous to an author that his book should be attacked as well as praised. Fame is a shuttlecock. If it be struck at only one end of the room, it will soon fall to the ground. To keep it up, it must be struck at both ends." -- Samuel Johnson

On dialogue: "Dialogue in fiction should be reserved for the culminating moments and regarded as the spray into which the great wave of narrative breaks in curving toward the watcher on the shore." -- Edith Wharton

On discouragement: "Writing is easy. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein." -- Red Smith

On drink: "First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you." -- F. Scott Fitzgerald

On editors and editing: "Bow down before them. They know what they are doing." -- Quentin Crisp

On grammar and usage: "Usage is the only test. I prefer a phrase that is easy and unaffected to a phrase that is grammatical." -- W. Somerset Maugham

Excerpted from Advice to Writers: A Compendium of Quotes, Anecdotes, and Writerly Wisdom from a Dazzling Array of Literary Lights by Jon Winokur
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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Advice to Writers A Compendium of Quotes, Anecdotes, and Writerly Wisdom from a Dazzling Array of Literary Lights

Advice to Writers A Compendium of Quotes, Anecdotes, and Writerly Wisdom from a Dazzling Array of Literary Lights

0679763414

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