Name: Zen in the Art of Writing: The memoir and writing guide by the author of Farenheit 451
Author: Ray Bradbury

Cover of Zen in the Art of Writing: The memoir and writing guide by the author of Farenheit 451

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Ray Bradbury

69 highlights · 24 notes · last read March 2025

Highlights I wrote a note on are shown in full. The other 46 are scrambled: the words are the author's, so here you only see where in the book I underlined something.

Every morning I jump out of bed and step on a landmine. The landmine is me. After the explosion, I spend the rest of the day putting the pieces together.
Location 95

My note Ray Bradbury quote that i love

Irritations and angers aside, what about loves? What do you love most in the world? The big and little things, I mean. A trolley car, a pair of tennis shoes? These, at one time when we were children, were invested with magic for us.
Page 3

My note Write about what i love the most. Or hate the most.

What do you want more than anything else in the world? What do you love, or what do you hate?
Page 4

My note The "FORMULA"

Find a character, like yourself, who will want something or not want something, with all his heart. Give him running orders. Shoot him off. Then follow as fast as you can go. The character, in his great love, or hate, will rush you through to the end of the story. The zest and gusto of his need, and there is zest in hate as well as in love, will fire the landscape and raise the temperature of your typewriter thirty degrees.
Page 4

My note Find a character
Give running orders
Tell him to run
Follow (if you can)

The history of each story, then, should read almost like a weather report:
Page 4

My note "The history of each story" - like PGs live editing and rewriting

Time enough to think and cut and rewrite tomorrow. But today – explode – fly apart – disintegrate! The other six or seven drafts are going to be pure torture.
Page 4

My note Enjoy it to the fullest because the edits will be brutal ANYWAYS

So why not enjoy the first draft,
Page 5

My note Enjy the first draft

It doesn’t have to be a big fire.
Page 5

My note A fire is a fire regardless of size. A cat is a cat. Money is money.

When did you last read a book of poetry or take time, of an afternoon, for an essay or two? Have you ever read a single issue of Geriatrics, the Official Journal of the American Geriatrics Society,
Page 5

My note Taste and sample widely!

What can we writers learn from lizards, lift from birds? In quickness is truth.
Page 7

My note "In quickness is truth."

The faster you blurt, the more swiftly you write, the more honest you are. In hesitation is thought. In delay comes the effort for a style, instead of leaping upon truth which is the only style worth deadfalling or tiger-trapping.
Page 7

My note TRUTH IS THE ONLY STYLE WORTH TIGER-TRAPPING

quadruple- layered mudpies, all language and style, that would not float, and sank without a trace.
Page 8

My note Good writing floats

I wrote at least a thousand words a day every day from the age of twelve on.
Page 8

My note 1.000 words every day - practise

I finally figured out that if you are going to step on a live mine, make it your own.
Page 9

My note If you blow up, at least make sure its your own mine

The lists ran something like this: THE LAKE. THE NIGHT. THE CRICKETS. THE RAVINE. THE ATTIC. THE BASEMENT. THE TRAPDOOR. THE BABY. THE CROWD. THE NIGHT TRAIN. THE FOG HORN. THE SCYTHE. THE CARNIVAL. THE CAROUSEL. THE DWARF. THE MIRROR MAZE. THE SKELETON.
Page 10

My note A list of nouns , each one a story

My note More nouns

‘That’s me’; or, ‘That’s an idea I like!’
Page 12

My note All so i may discover a character and say "Thats ME!"

Holy Moses! Why not write a story about a man who is terrified to discover that under his skin, inside his flesh, hidden, is a symbol of all the Gothic horrors in history – a skeleton!
Page 13

My note HOLY MOSES MOMENT - The story wrote itself

The story wrote itself in a few hours.
Page 13

My note After 30 years of 1.000 words, learnimg to type, learning to write-write, after the break-ups, after all the notes: "HOLY MOSES!"

I began to gain steam. The ideas came faster now, and all of them from my lists.
Page 13

My note Have lists. Love lists. Hate lists.

Your Thing at the top of your stairs in your own private night…may well come down. 1986
Page 20

My note Make your lists, taste the darkness.

Remington or Underwood typewriters which rented out at a dime a half hour. You thrust your dime in, the clock ticked madly, and you typed wildly, to finish before the half hour ran out.
Page 51

My note Rented typewriters ?!

We build tensions toward laughter, then give permission, and laughter comes. We build tensions toward sorrow, and at last say cry, and hope to see our audience in tears.
Page 87

My note Build tension, then allow surrender

I was rich and didn’t know it.
Page 90

My note I was rich and didnt know it

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