...the vital point to remember is that the swine who just sent your pearl of a story back with nothing but a coffee-stain and a printed rejection slip can be wrong. You cannot take it for granted that he is wrong, but you have an all-important margin of hope that might be enough to keep you going.

Brian Stableford

Categorized in : Writing Coffee Rejection

People are certainly impressed by the aura of creative power which a writer may wear, but can easily demolish it with a few well-chosen questions. Bob Shaw has observed that the deadliest questions usually come as a pair: "Have you published anything?" - loosely translated as: I've never heard of you - and "What name do you write under?" - loosely translatable as: I've definitely never heard of you.

Brian Stableford

names writing people

Unless we dream the best dreams of which we are capable, the futu... by Brian Stableford

Unless we dream the best dreams of which we are capable, the future will be poorer than it might be.

Brian Stableford

capable dream might

There are infimal readers, readers who want to read the same book over and over, but will never read the same book twice.

Brian Stableford

reader want book

The world is not bound to get better as a result of new discoveries in science and technology, nor is it bound to get worse, there will simply be new opportunities for making it better or worse.

Brian Stableford

technology opportunity discovery

Science fiction is essentially a kind of fiction in which people learn more about how to live in the real world, visiting imaginary worlds unlike our own, in order to investigate by way of pleasurable thought-experiments how things might be done differently.

Brian Stableford

real order people

Not merely one of the finest fantasy novels of recent years, but one of the finest ever. Should not be missed

Brian Stableford

fantasy-novels finest years

Belief in God is an elementary form of selflessness - the acknowledgement of responsibility toward a hypothetical 'Other'.

Brian Stableford

form responsibility belief god

God moves in mysterious ways. All gods do. It's the only way they... by Brian Stableford

God moves in mysterious ways. All gods do. It's the only way they can work.

Brian Stableford

mysterious god work way

Writing might be unalloyed joy, were it not for the fact that power is always shadowed by responsibility. Thankfully, the absolute power that writers have is not weighted down with absolute responsibility. It can neither be suppressed nor diminished, except by choice.

Brian Stableford

down responsibility power joy

Writers can express ideas and emotions that are important to them but have no other means of expression. Some of these ideas may be fantastic, and some of the emotions may be given clearer voice in fantastic fiction.

Brian Stableford

emotions voice important ideas

From the viewpoint of the writer, the most significant aspect of fantasy and science fiction is that stories of these kinds are either set in imaginary worlds or feature the appearance in the familiar world of some imaginary entity.

Brian Stableford

fantasy appearance science world

Ideally, writing ought to be like riding a bicycle: something you know how to do without having to think consciously about exactly what it is that you are doing.

Brian Stableford

think you bicycle riding