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There are cities that get by on their good looks, offer climate and scenery, views of mountains or oceans, rockbound or with palm trees. And there are cities like Detroit that have to work for a living.
Elmore Leonard
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Elmore Leonard
Age: 87 †
Born: 1925
Born: October 11
Died: 2013
Died: August 20
Author
Film Producer
Novelist
Prosaist
Screenwriter
Writer
New Orleans
Louisiana
Dutch Leonard
Elmore John Leonard Jr.
Tree
Palms
Views
Mountains
Cities
Trees
Living
Offer
Looks
Climate
Palm
Work
Mountain
Oceans
Good
Ocean
Scenery
Like
Offers
Detroit
More quotes by Elmore Leonard
Everyone has his own sound. I'm not going to presume how to tell anybody how to write.
Elmore Leonard
I'm very much aware in the writing of dialogue, or even in the narrative too, of a rhythm. There has to be a rhythm with it … Interviewers have said, you like jazz, don’t you? Because we can hear it in your writing. And I thought that was a compliment.
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Don't worry about what your mother thinks of your language.
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I do have fun writing, and a long time ago, I told myself, 'You got to have fun at this, or it'll drive you nuts.'
Elmore Leonard
I won't read a book that starts with a description of the weather. I don't read books over 300 pages, though I'll make an exception for Don Delillo.
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I still read Hemingway. I still read his short stories because they're so good. He doesn't waste any words.
Elmore Leonard
What do you tell a man with two black eyes? Nothing, he's already been told twice.
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I don’t think writers compete, I think they’re all doing separate things in their own style.
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I once saw Dizzy Gillespie at a live show, and it made me want to go home immediately and start writing.
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Bad guys are not bad guys twenty-four hours a day.
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I don't want the reader to be aware of me as the writer.
Elmore Leonard
I never see my bad guys as simply bad. They want pretty much the same thing that you and I want: they want to be happy.
Elmore Leonard
I have fun writing. I don't make it a chore. I don't have to struggle with it.
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Never use the words 'suddenly' or 'all hell broke loose.'
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My most important piece of advice to all you would-be writers: when you write, try to leave out all the parts readers skip.
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It doesn't have to make sense, it just has to sound like it does.
Elmore Leonard
I try to leave out the parts readers skip.
Elmore Leonard
A man can be in two different places and he will be two different men. Maybe if you think of more places he will be more men, but two is enough for now.
Elmore Leonard
My purpose is to entertain and please myself. I feel that if I am entertained, then there will be enough other readers who will be entertained, too.
Elmore Leonard
If you take a few days to write an outline, you're just making up scenes that you think will work, that you think will be interesting. But as you write it, other ideas occur - better ideas that have to do with what you're writing.
Elmore Leonard
