Jeff Vandermeer Writing Quotations

The music I listen to while writing is really scene-specific. It's just a great motivator, a way to put myself in the mood.

I have to have music as a soundtrack to writing fiction. I listen to it at other times, too, but it helps me write.

I've always wrestled with the difference between plot and structure, and after re-reading a lot of writing books I realized I wasn't alone.

Position yourself to succeed by doing the other things in your life that rejuvenate you. You can create little islands of time away from your novel that will help preserve your balance. Exhaustion will affect both your writing’s quality and your productivity.

Trust your imagination. Don't be afraid to fail. Write. Revise. Revise. Revise.

One of the most important things as a writing instructor is to provide a lot of different entry points to subjects. To not impose your own personal experience as the One True Way.

I believe the best creative writing lessons live in the specifics.

My parents read to me a lot as a kid, and I started writing very early, probably spurred on by Aesop's fables. Then they gave me The Lord of the Rings way too early for me to fully understand what I was reading, which was actually kind of cool. It was almost better - comprehension's overrated when you're reading.

Angela Carter's fiction blew me away and really instilled a passion for writing, bolstered by Vladimir Nabokov. But in general, I can't point to any one thing. I just always loved books and writing.

The best visual book I can think of is Lynda Barry's What It Is, but although I refer to it all the time it's not a creative writing book per se.