This isn't really a query, more an encouragement.
There have been a number of questions recently from those concerned that their writing's not good enough, for some reason. I think we probably all suffer from that doubt.
The usual, and best, advice is to keep on writing, so when I came across this quote today from Theodore Roosevelt, particularly apt for all who write, I thought I'd reproduce it here.
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
"The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions . . . who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Keep the faith, chaps :)
Jonathon, I believe that most writers suffer from self-doubt and go through mini crises.
A few more quotes on writing.
The first draft of everything is always shit - Ernest Hemingway.
Try. Fail. Fail better - Samuel Beckett
Easy reading is damn hard writing - Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Writing is hard work and bad for the health - E. B. White.
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts - Winston Churchill.
If you're going through hell, keep going - Winston Churchill.
Very much appreciated :)
I needed that, thanks. See I'm a teenager obsessed with English literature and sometimes in my enthusiasm I write like a tacky version of Cinderella filled with too many theatrics and descriptions of the scenery. Its so embarrassing when someone reads its loud back to me. I hope I can write more simply and write less but still deliver what I want to.