Quotes by Screenwriters - Page 87

All the world knew that a maester forged his silver link when he learned the art of healing—but the world preferred to forget that men who knew how to heal also knew how to kill.
George R.R. Martin
Time heals all wounds. And if it doesn't, you name them something other than wounds and agree to let them stay.
Emma Forrest
You should never apologize for existing, Lev. Not even to all those people out there who wish you didn't.
Neal Shusterman
I think the reward for conformity is that everyone likes you except yourself.
Rita Mae Brown
There are worse things than being robbed..." I could smell the sick old-meat stench on his breath, like he really had eaten my grandmother. "...worse things than dyin' even. You be a good boy, Little Red, and maybe you'll get to live awhile. Maybe you'll get to die in your own natural time.
Neal Shusterman
Everybody's got skeletons in the closets. Every once in a while, you've got to open up the closet and the let the skeletons breathe. Half the time, the very thing you think is gonna destroy you or ruin you is the very thing that nobody cares about. My advice to people with skeletons is to dust them off every now and then-- as long as your closet's aint full of them. It's not good to have more than two or three.
Tyler Perry
What I have learned in this life is you can never be ashamed of where you come from.
Tyler Perry
The sign of the amateur is overglorification of and preoccupation with the mystery. The professional shuts up. She doesn't talk about it. She does her work.
Steven Pressfield
You know Quinn?" Macaulay asked me."Ten minutes ago I was putting him to bed."Macaulay grinned. "I hope you keep his acquaintance like that - social""Meaning what?"Macaulay's grin became rueful. "He used to be my broker, and his advice led me right up to the poorhouse steps.""That's sweet," I said. "he's my broker now and I'm following his advice." Macaulay and the girl laughed. I pretended I was laughing and returned to my table.
Dashiell Hammett
Story should be a descent -- the feeling that there is an intense gravity to the narrative that draws you down, down, down.
Chuck Wendig
If you think someone is humble, never tell them so. You will unknowingly rob them of the very thing you admire.
Christy Hall
Having bad experiences sometimes helps; it makes it clearer what it is youshould be doing. I know that sounds very Pollyannaish but it’s true. People who have had only good experiences aren’t very interesting. They may be content, and happy after a fashion, but they aren’t very deep. It may seem a misfortune now, and it makes things difficult, but well—it’s easy to feel all the happy, simple stuff. Not that happiness is necessarily simple. But I don’t think you’re going to have a life like that, and I think you’ll be the better for it. The difficult thing is to not be overwhelmed by the bad patches. You mustn’t let them defeat you. You must see them as a gift—a cruel gift, but a gift nonetheless.
Peter Cameron
Remember, people who peek through keyholes have to expect an occasional poke in the eye.
Gary K. Wolf
No matter how long a log of wood remains in the river it does not become a crocodile
Jude Idada
Bed rest and a large steaming mug of hot chocolate. I always find that cheers me up.
J.K. Rowling
She even told me how to treat a girl on a date, which was very interesting. She said that with a girl like Mary Elizabeth, you shouldn't tell her she looks pretty. You should tell her how nice her outfit is because her outfit is her choice whereas her face isn't. She also said that with some girls, you should do things like open car doors and buy flowers, but with Mary Elizabeth (especially since it's the Sadie Hawkins' dance), I shouldn't do that. So, I asked her what I should do, and she said that I should ask a lot of questions and not mind when Mary Elizabeth doesn't stop talking. I said that it didn't sound very democratic, but Sam said she does it all the time with boys.
Stephen Chbosky
. . . [E]very single writer I met likened writing for television to one thing--laying track for an incoming speeding train. The story is the track and you gotta keep laying it down because of the train. That train is production. You keep writing, you keep laying track down, no matter what, because the train of production is coming toward you--no matter what. Every eight days, the crew needs to being to prepare a new episode--find locations, build sets, design costumes, find props, plan shots. And every eight days after that, the crew needs to film a new episode. Every eight days. Eight days to prep. Eight days to shoot. Eight days, eight days, eight days, eight days. Which means every eight days, that crew needs a brand-new script. And my job is to damn well provide them with one. Every. Eight. Days. That train of production is a'coming. Every eight days that crew on that soundstage better have something to shoot. Because the worst thing you can do is halt or derail production and cost the studio hundreds of thousands of dollars while everyone waits. That is how you go from being a TV writer to being a failed TV writer.
Shonda Rhimes
... good advice was sometimes easier to give than receive.
Stephen King
I used to hammer away at the idea of simplicity.In both fiction and non-fiction, there's only one question and one answer. 'What happened?' the reader asks. 'This is what happened,' the writer responds. 'This...and this...and this, too.' Keep it simple. It's the only sure way home.
Stephen King
The lessons my parents taught are still with me. I keep a tighter leash when raising my kids than my parents did, but I often find myself doing or saying the same things they did. My mom, for instance, was always cheerful when coming in from work; I try to behave the same way when I finish writing for the day. My dad would listen intently when I came to him with a problem, to help me find a way to solve it on my own; I try to do the same with my own kids. At night, while I'm tucking my kids in bed, I ask them to tell me three nice things that each of their siblings did for them that day, in the hopes that it will help them grow as close as Micah, Dana, and I did. And more frequently than I ever would have imagined possible growing up, I find myself telling my children "It's your life", or "No one ever promised that life would be fair", and "What you want and what you get are usually two entirely different things".
Nicholas Sparks
I go on the presumption that everyone's full of shit until proven otherwise, and this usually serves me in good stead.
Dennis Lehane
In the shower today I tried to think about the best advice I'd ever been given by another writer. There was something that someone said at my first Milford, about using style as a covering, but sooner or later you would have to walk naked down the street, that was useful...And then I remembered. It was Harlan Ellison about a decade ago.He said, "Hey. Gaiman. What's with the stubble? Every time I see you, you're stubbly. What is it? Some kind of English fashion statement?""Not really.""Well? Don't they have razors in England for Chrissakes?""If you must know, I don't like shaving because I have a really tough beard and sensitive skin. So by the time I've finished shaving I've usually scraped my face a bit. So I do it as little as possible.""Oh." He paused. "I've got that too. What you do is, you rub your stubble with hair conditioner. Leave it a couple of minutes, then wash it off. Then shave normally. Makes it really easy to shave. No scraping."I tried it. It works like a charm. Best advice from a writer I've ever received.
Neil Gaiman
I would rather be confused for 10 minutes than bored for 5 seconds.
Russell T. Davies
Here are the two states in which you may exist: person who writes, or person who does not. If you write: you are a writer. If you do not write: you are not. Aspiring is a meaningless null state that romanticizes Not Writing. It’s as ludicrous as saying, “I aspire to pick up that piece of paper that fell on the floor.” Either pick it up or don’t. I don’t want to hear about how your diaper’s full. Take it off or stop talking about it.
Chuck Wendig
Now go and make interesting mistakes, make amazing mistakes, make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for your being here.
Neil Gaiman
Stay stupid. Follow your unconventional, crazy heart.
Steven Pressfield
One bullet can really fuck up your day.
Mark Haskell Smith
Never have children, only grandchildren.
Gore Vidal
If you are going to worry, don't do it. If you do it, don't worry.
Michael Nolan
Really, he thought, if you couldn't trust a poet to offer sensible advice, who could you trust?
Neil Gaiman
Don't start an argument with somebody who has a microphone when you don't. They'll make you look like chopped liver.
Harlan Ellison
The strongest trees are rooted in the dark places of the earth. Darkness will be your cloak, your shield, your mother's milk. Darkness will make you strong.
George R.R. Martin
She said they needed to put down a real root system to achieve their potential
Holly Goldberg Sloan
Close your eyes and click your heals three times...because there's no place like Dome.
Stephen King
I'm killing time and it's dying hard.
Raymond Chandler
That if a thing is defined in contrast that's what life is, the shadow of death. So the mystery of death couldn't be the bad thing, because without it there wouldn't be life. The badness was life, just happening, as essential a part of the good as the good. And what was there to do but to take it as it comes and to hope, to hope constantly and carnally and with no time to lose.
Brian McGreevy
What am I to God? Nothing, a murky shadow. My passage on this earth is too rapid to leave any traces; it counts for nothing in space or in time. God really doesn't pay any attention to us, so even if he exists, it's as if he didn't. My form of atheism, however, leads inevitably to an acceptance of the inexplicable. Mystery is inseparable from chance, and our whole universe is a mystery. Since I reject the idea of a divine watchmaker (a notion even more mysterious than the mystery it supposedly explains), then I must consent to live in a kind of shadowy confusion. And insofar as no explication, even the simplest, works for everyone, I've chosen my mystery. At least it keeps my moral freedom intact.
Luis Buñuel
Question marks are shaped like hooks for a reason: they will hook the reader and drag them deeper into the story
Chuck Wendig
At that exact moment, 6-0-0, the sun climbed over the skyline of oaks, revealing its full summer angry-god self. Its reflection flared across the river toward our house, a long, blaring finger aimed at me through our frail bedroom curtains. Accusing: You have been seen. You will be seen.
Gillian Flynn
The problem with the so-called bloody surveillance state is that it’s hard work trying to track someone’s movements using CCTV – especially if they’re on foot. Part of the problem is that the cameras all belong to different people for different reasons. Westminster Council has a network for traffic violations, the Oxford Street Trading Association has a huge network aimed at shop-lifters and pickpockets, individual shops have their own systems, as do pubs, clubs and buses. When you walk around London it is important to remember that Big Brother may be watching you, or he could be having a piss, or reading the paper or helping redirect traffic around a car accident or maybe he’s just forgotten to turn the bloody thing on.
Ben Aaronovitch
And when the sun sets...then the night magic spreads out above your head; worlds and universes a-borning and a-dying—stars and planets and galaxies. And the bigger the telescope they can make, and the farther into the beyond they are able to penetrate, the greater grows the mystery.
Paul Gallico
Next time she’d have to ask him to keep the light on while he did it, so she could watch his face. That was the best part of the whole thing as far as she was concerned, the way a guy’s face contorted so violently and then relaxed, as if some terrible mystery had just been solved.
Tom Perrotta
It was quite elementary,' returned the detective with a languid gesture of one hand.
Anthony Horowitz
You look at me as if I were a conjuror,' Holmes remarked, with a laugh.
Anthony Horowitz
She'd always despised the whole other woman thing, but here she was, entertaining the possibility.
Diana Stevan
what are you thinking, Amy? How are you feeling? Who are you? What have we ddone to each other? What will we do?
Gillian Flynn
It's goddamned funny in this police racket how an old woman can look out of a window and see a guy running and pick him out of a line-up six months later, but we can show hotel help a clear photo and they just can't be sure.''That's one of the qualifications for good hotel help,' I said.
Raymond Chandler
Fuck you! Someone has tortured and killed one of your girls and you couldn’t give a damn? I thought you were supposed to protect them, to be their guardian. Isn’t that what pimps do?’ Garcia’s face flared red.
Chris Carter
A wedge of sunlight slipped over the edge of the desk and fell noiselessly to the carpet.
Raymond Chandler
Hunter let go of JJ who started dusting his jacket with both hands. ‘Look at what you’ve done to my suit man, these things don’t come cheap you know.’ Garcia checked his pocket change. ‘Here.’ He extended his hand towards JJ. ‘A dollar ninety-five. Go buy another one.
Chris Carter
She was a cute as a washtub.
Raymond Chandler
When I couldn't speak I was not drawn into silence, silence captured me.
Thomas Harris
Because you can't be as in love as we were and not have it invade your bone marrow. Our kind of love can go into remission, but it's always waiting to return. Like the world's sweetest cancer.
Gillan Flynn
But like so many others nowadays, poor Julian wanted to believe that man's life is profoundly more significant than it is. His sickness was the sickness of our age. We want so much not to be extinguished at the end that we will go to any length to make conjuror-tricks for one another simply to obscure the bitter, secret knowledge that it is our fate not to be.
Gore Vidal
It's amazing what the discovery of a corpse can do for one's spirits.
Alan Bradley
When you’retwenty-one, life is a roadmap.It’s only when you get to betwenty-five or so that youbegin to suspect you’ve beenlooking at the map upsidedown, and not until you’reforty are you entirely sure.
Stephen King
But sooner or later the last good time would come around. It does for all of us.
Stephen King
She looked beautiful,standing there barefoot in her faded jeans. I wanted to take her in my arms, and lift her, and carry her into some untroubled future.Instead, I left her where she was. That's not the world we live in, she'd said, and how right she was,
Stephen King
We're not quite ending where we began, but close enough.Close enough.
Stephen King
There are many good reasons for drinking, and one's just entered my head: If you don't drink when you're living, how the fuck can you drink when you're dead?
Warren Ellis