Fun Facts About Writers and Writing
“Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul.”
Joyce Carol Oates has written 58 novels, over 30 collections of short stories, eight volumes of poetry, plays, innumerable essays and book reviews, as well as longer nonfiction works.
Theodor Seuss Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss, had a collection of nearly 300 hats, which he would choose from when he suffered a case of writer's block.
John Green promised to sign every pre-ordered copy of The Fault In Our Stars, which turned out to be 150,000 copies. (We should all have such problems.)
Not to be negative, but less than 1 percent of books published in the US annually make the US Best Sellers lists. You have a better chance of winning the lotto or being struck by lightning twice than writing a book, and making the Best Sellers list.(Keep trying anyway!)
Octavia Butler, author of Bloodchild and Other Stories, once worked as a potato chip inspector.
F. Scott Fitzgerald was named for Francis Scott Key, who wrote the lyrics for "The Star Spangled Banner."
Chilean American author Isabel Allende began writing her first novel on January 8, 1981. It started as a letter to her grandfather who was dying. It became the basis for book The House of the Spirits. Allende now begins all of her books on January 8.
It has been widely reported that Gertrude Stein's final words to Toklas were, "What is the answer?" With no reply forthcoming, Stein followed with, "In that case, what is the question?"
Ernest Hemingway is credited with writing one of the shortest stories ever:
His six-word story, "For sale: baby shoes, never worn," is often cited as an example of brevity in writing. (And beauty.)
Neil Simon, author of more than 30 plays and nearly as many movie scripts, including The Odd Couple and Barefoot in the Park, warned aspiring comedy writers, "not to try to make it funny. . . try and make it real and then the comedy will come.”
Best known for Little Women and its sequels, Louisa May Alcott, also wrote pulp fiction and about her experiences as a Civil War nurse.
Russian writer Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1878) are often cited as pinnacles of realist fiction and two of the greatest novels ever written.