- Britta Eastburg Friesen
Writers on Revision
Updated: Aug 2, 2019

"To destroy is always the first step in any creation."
- e. e. cummings
"All writing is a campaign against cliche. Not just cliches of the pen but cliches of the mind and cliches of the heart."
- Martin Amis
"I have rewritten―often several times―every word I have ever published. My pencils outlast their erasers."
- Vladimir Nabokov
"If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it."
- Elmore Leonard
"The wastepaper basket is the author's best friend."
- Isaac Bashevis Singer
“Throw up into your typewriter every morning. Clean up every noon.”
- Raymond Chandler
“By the time I am nearing the end of a story, the first part will have been reread and altered and corrected at least one hundred and fifty times. I am suspicious of both facility and speed. Good writing is essentially rewriting. I am positive of this.”
- Roald Dahl
“The more you leave out, the more you highlight what you leave in.” - Henry Green
