Quotes by Screenwriters - Page 38

Souls are more important than stories, yes. But stories are a window to the soul. Without stories, the soul suffocates.
Christy Hall
There is only one way to overcome the difficulty of writing, and that is to write. Thought only becomes effective and productive at the time of writing.
Amélie Nothomb
I still believe in you, as a writer, but the only stuff we ever had in common doesn't travel very far.""What stuff is that?" he'd asked her."We're completely at ease being naked in front of strangers and total fuckheads", she'd told him. Maybe that's part of what being a writer entails, Danny Baciagalupo found himself thinking on that rainy spring night in Iowa city.
John Irving
It is a wise writer who knows his own subconscious.
Ray Bradbury
If a writer manages to be fascinating about his own novels, then there are only two possibilities: either he is merely voicing out loud what he wrote in his book, and he is a parrot; or he is explaining interesting things that he didn't discuss in his book, in which case the book in question is a failure since it does not live up to its claims.
Amélie Nothomb
But if you needed to HAVE AN IDEA, boredom could be to a roadblocked novel what chemotherapy was to a cancer patient.
Stephen King
Writers are cannibals. They really are. They are predators, and if you are friends with them, and if you say anything funny at dinner, or if anything good happens to you, you are in big trouble.
Nora Ephron
Don't be a writer; it's a terrible way to live your life. There's nothing to be gained from it but poverty and obscurity and solitude. So if you have a taste for all those things, which means that you really are burning to do it, then go ahead and do it. But don't expect anything from anybody.
Paul Auster
I don't think writers should write about answers. I think writers should write about questions.
Paul Haggis
Fictional characters are made of words, not flesh; they do not have free will, they do not exercise volition. They are easily born, and as easily killed off.
John Banville
Writing isn't about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end it's about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life as well. It's about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy. ...this book...is a permission slip: you can, you should, and if you're brave enough to start, you will. Writing is magic, as much the water of life as any other creative art. The water is free. So drink. Drink and be filled up.
Stephen King
But you're dead," said Harry."Oh yes," said Dumbledore matter-of-factly."Then...I'm dead too?""Ah," said Dumbledore, smiling still more broadly. "That is the question, isn't it? On the whole, dear boy, I think not.”They looked at each other, the old man still beaming."Not?" repeated Harry."Not," said Dumbledore."But…" Harry raised his hand instinctively toward the lightning scar. It did not seem to be there. "But I should have died—I didn't defend myself! I meant to let him kill me!""And that," said Dumbledore, "will, I think, have made all the difference.
J.K. Rowling
Death loves death, not life. Dying people love to know that others die with them; it is a comfort to learn you are not alone in the kiln, in the grave.
Ray Bradbury
It must have been fifty seconds before Doc died.Long time.
William Goldman
The last good time always comes
Stephen King
Rings and magazines; keychains and umbrellas; hats and glasses; rattles and radios. They looked like different things, but Ralph thought they were really all the same thing: the faint, sorrowing voices of people who had found themselves written out of the script in the middle of the second act while they were still learning their lines for the third, people who had been unceremoniously hauled off before their work was done or their obligations fulfilled, people whose only crime had been to be born in the Random... and to have caught the eye of the madman with the rusty scalpel.
Stephen King
So many die without our caring, decline to silence in rooms beyond hearing. We honor the dead and abhor the dying.- from the story "De Composition
David Benioff
What could be more intimate than dying with someone?
Sarah Lotz
Dying is not dead.
George R.R. Martin
The dust was antique spice, burnt maple leaves, a prickling blue that teemed and sifted to earth. Swarming its own shadows, the dust filtered over the tents.
Ray Bradbury
Embrace death, dance with it a while, and finally fall prey to it.
Darren Shan
Dying is easy, but victory comes hard.
George R.R. Martin
Silver’s sweet and gold’s our mother, but once you’re dead they’re worth less than that last shit you take as you lie dying.
George R.R. Martin
Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you're there. It doesn't matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn-cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime.
Ray Bradbury
That's the good part of dying; when you've nothing to lose, you run any risk you want.
Ray Bradbury
If you make a fool of yourself in front of a cat, he will sneer at you, if you are sober; he will leave the room if you are drunk. If you make a fool of yourself in front a dog, he will make a fool of himself, too.
Chuck Jones
No one has ever been able to discover how they make this subtle sound, and what is more, no one ever will. It is a secret that has endured from the very beginning of the time of cats and will never be revealed.
Paul Gallico
But there was a kitten on my pillow, and it was purring in my face and vibrating gently with every purr, and, very soon, I slept.
Neil Gaiman
The ball of dark fur pressed itself into my chest, and I wished she was my kitten, and knew that she was not.
Neil Gaiman
Cats don’t have names,” it said.“No?” said Coraline.“No,” said the cat. “Now, you people have names. That’s because you don’t know who you are. We know who we are, so we don’t need names.”There was something irritatingly self-centered about the cat, Coraline decided. As if it were, in its opinion, the only thing in any world or place that could possibly be of any importance.Half of her wanted to be very rude to it; the other half of her wanted to be polite and deferential. The polite half won.
Neil Gaiman
All you need for a movie is a gun and a cat.
Jean-Luc Godard
...staring into thin air at thosethings only cats can see (Doctro Sleep)
Stephen King
Cats never weep, she told herself, no more than wolves. It's just a stupid dream.
George R.R. Martin
Tramps and vagabonds have marks they make on gateposts and trees and doors, letting others of their kind know a little about the people who live at the houses and farms they pass on their travels. I think cats must leave similar signs; how else to explain the cats who turn up at our door through the year, hungry and flea-ridden and abandoned?
Neil Gaiman
God I have been - God I am. But quite frankly, sometimes it is all just a little too much for one small cat.
Paul Gallico
John Grady looked at the table. The paper cat stepped thin and slant among the shapes of cats thereon. He looked up again. Yessir, he said. Just me and him.
Cormac McCarthy
People happily kill other people in the name of everything from a god to a country to an overly developed sense of annoyance when someone cuts across two lanes on a freeway without signaling. Cats will, on occasion, kill other cats but for the most part they are content to puff up their furr, yowl like banshees, and rip the occassional ear off - and all this is usually done for the sake of food or protecting their own territory (which may not be condonable but it is at least rational) .
Peter Gethers
I love cats, they're great; intelligent, affectionate, lovable, and this one was particularly nice, so picking it up and giving it a few slaps and a bit of a rough time was galling, even though it was unfortunately necessary. See, if you're hiding in someone's spare bedroom waiting for them to turn in for the night, the last thing you need is a cat meowing at the door trying to get in to see you because you've been stroking it all day. A bit of a shake and a growl in the cat's face and that's all that's usually needed for it to give the spare room and the horrible bastard inside a wide berth for the rest of the night.
Danny King
There are those who have suggested that the tendency of a cat to play with its prey is a merciful one...
Neil Gaiman
Japanese goldfish,With your gossamer tail,You are the loveliest creatureI have ever seen.""Japanese kitten,Put your tongue back in where it belongsAnd go away.I know exactly what you are thinking.
Paul Gallico
The Lady Amalthea beckoned, and the cat wriggled all over, like a dog, but he would not come near... She was offering her open palm to the crook-eared cat, but he stayed where he was, shivering with the desire to go to her"...[later, Molly asked the cat] "Why were you afraid to let her touch you? I saw you. You were afraid of her.""If she had touched me," he said very softly, "I would have been hers and not my own, not ever again. I wanted her to touch me but I could not let her. No cat will... The price is more than a cat can pay.
Peter S Beagle
The cat dropped the rat between its two front paws. "There are those," it said with a sigh, in tones as smooth as oiled silk, "who have suggested that the tendency of a cat to play with its prey is a merciful one - after all, it permits the occasional funny little running snack to escape, from time to time. How often does your dinner get to escape?
Neil Gaiman
She smiled again. "Do you like cat?" she said."Yes," said Richard. "I quite like cats."Anaesthesia looked relieved. "Thigh?" she asked, "or breast?
Neil Gaiman
The cat wrinkled its nose and managed to look unimpressed. "Calling cats," it confided, "tends to be a rather overrated activity. Might as well call a whirlwind.
Neil Gaiman
I am what I am. I would tell you what you want to know if I could, for you have been kind to me. But I am a cat, and no cat anywhere ever gave anyone a straight answer.
Peter S Beagle
What's your name,' Coraline asked the cat. 'Look, I'm Coraline. Okay?''Cats don't have names,' it said.'No?' said Coraline.'No,' said the cat. 'Now you people have names. That's because you don't know who you are. We know who we are, so we don't need names.
Neil Gaiman
I would like to see anyone, prophet, king or God, convince a thousand cats to do the same thing at the same time.
Neil Gaiman
Remember to always be yourself. Unless you suck.
Joss Whedon
Portia followed after, a smirk on her face, and Syc hissed as he passed.Donegan waited till they were gone, then swung round to Gracious."He hissed at me.""He hissed at you.""Should I hiss back?""It's a bit late.""He could still hear.""Not unless you run after him.""Do you think I should?""Probably not.""I think I should.""It'd be a bit weird.""You might be right." Donegan pursed his lips, then shook his fist at the doorway."That showed him," said Gracious.Donegan nodded. "He'll think twice about hissing at me again.
Derek Landy
Anything is possible if you've got enough nerve.
J.K. Rowling
Actions always have consequences!
Joel Coen
Surely the Gods did not bring me safe through fire and sea only to kill me with a flux.
George R.R. Martin
The judge like a great ponderous djinn stepped through the fire and the flames delivered him up as if he were in some way native to their element.
Cormac McCarthy
And what lights the sun? Its own fire. And the sun goes on, day after day, burning and burning. The sun and time. The sun and time and burning. Burning. The river bobbled him along gently. Burning. The sun and every clock on the earth. It all came together and became a single thing in his mind. After a long time of floating on the land and a short time of floating in the river he knew why he must never burn again in his life.
Ray Bradbury
You're playing with fire," she warned him."That's how I know I'm alive.
Neil Gaiman
Life is warmth and warmth is fire, and fire is God's and God's alone.
George R.R. Martin
What fire joins none man can put aside,
George R.R. Martin
Any cat may stare into a fire and see red mice play,
George R.R. Martin
The fire that burns against the cold.
George R.R. Martin
Ice can kill as dead as fire.
George R.R. Martin