Vicki

“Writer's block comes from the feeling that one is doing the
wrong thing or doing the right thing badly. Fiction written for
the wrong reason may fail to satisfy the motive behind it and
thus may block the writer, as I've said; but there is no wrong
motive for writing fiction. At least in some instances, good
fiction has come from the writer's wish to be loved, his wish
to take revenge, his wish to work out his psychological woes,
his wish for money, and so on. No motive is too low for art;
finally it's the art, not the motive, that we judge.”
― John Gardner, On Becoming a Novelist

“Fiction, like sculpture or painting, begins with a rough
sketch. One gets down the characters and their behavior any
way one can, knowing the sentences will have to be revised,knowing the characters' actions may change. It makes no difference
how clumsy the sketch is—sketches are not supposed
to be polished and elegant. All that matters is that, going over
and over the sketch as if one had all eternity for finishing one's
story, one improves now this sentence, now that, noticing
what changes the new sentences urge, and in the process one
gets the characters and their behavior clearer in one's head,
gradually discovering deeper and deeper implications of the
characters' problems and hopes.”
― john gardner, On Becoming a Novelist

“It is the nature of stupid people to hide their perplexity and attack what they cannot grasp.”
― John Gardner, On Becoming a Novelist

“It is this experience of seeing something one has written come alive—literally, not metaphorically, a character or scene daemonically entering the world by its own strange power, so that the writer feels not the creator but only the instrument, or conjurer, the priest who stumbled onto the magic spell—it is this experience of tapping some magic source that makes the writer an addict, willing to give up almost anything for his art, and makes him, if he fails, such a miserable human being.”
― John Gardner, On Becoming a Novelist