11 Quotes by Janet Burroway

Most writing is done between the mind and the hand, not between the hand and the page.

Good girls like myself need subversion. Being solemn, I aspire to comedy. Being a novelist, I aspire to the musical. Being organized, I aspire to luminous chaos. Loving the power of grammar and the fine distinctions of language, I seek the part of the mind I didn't know was there, the part 'sheer,' 'no-manfathomed,' 'cliffs of fall.

If character is the foreground of fiction, setting is the background, and as in a painting’s composition, the foreground may be in harmony or in conflict with the background.

In Literature, only trouble is interesting.

The human desire to know why is as powerful as the desire to know what happened next, and it is a desire of a higher order.

The sensation of writing a book is the sensation of spinning, blinded by love and daring. It is the sensation of rearing and peering from the bent tip of a grass blade, looking for a route.

What is the pattern of change?

I sit and pass judgment on myself: this is dull, this is unclear, this is insignificant: ergo I am dull, I am unclear, I am insignificant.

Reject without regret whatever seems on reflection wrongheaded, dull, destructive, or irrelevant to your vision. It’s just as important to be able to discriminate between helpful and unhelpful criticism as it is to be able to write.