For any writer, the ability to look at a sentence and see what's superfluous, what can be altered, revised, expanded, and, especially, cut, is essential. It's satisfying to see that sentence shrink, snap into place, and ultimately emerge in a more polished form: clear, economical, sharp.

Francine Prose

The sheer number of legendary narratives and historically verifiable incidents invites us to revise assumptions about the origins of biological and chemical warfare and its moral and technological constraints.

Adrienne Mayor

I don't really revise. I tend to rewrite.

Akhil Sharma

Inside me, 'Dragon Ball' became a thing of the past, but later, I got upset at the live-action film, revised the script for the anime film, and complained about the quality of the TV anime. I guess, at some point, it became a work that I like so much that I can't leave it alone.

Akira Toriyama

Each of my books took roughly one and a half years to write. Some may have taken a shorter time to write the draft and a longer time to revise, while others were the opposite.

Alex Flinn

Saint: A dead sinner revised and edited.

Ambrose Bierce

I've noticed it a lot. I'm not someone who revises. It's always the first movement, it's that. It's an instinct. Either it works straight away, or it won't ever work.

Amelie Nothomb

I edit as I write. I revise endlessly. I don't go forward until I know that what I've written is as good as I can make it.

Anita Shreve

I always entertain the notion that I'm wrong, or that I'll have to revise my opinion. Most of the time that feels good; sometimes it really hurts and is embarrassing.

Anthony Bourdain

I guess the thing I would say most fervently is that your original impulse to write something is an impulse you should trust, and that if it doesn't work on the first draft, which it hardly ever does, the commitment to revising ought to be something you embrace really early. And to revise and revise and revise.

Antonya Nelson

I hate editing. I love to write, but I hate to reread my stuff. To revise.

Barry Hannah

Of course, economic forecasts must be revised when new information arrives and are thus necessarily provisional.

Ben Bernanke

I've found that in business opportunities will constantly emerge or situations develop that make you revise your plans along the way.

Benjamin Cohen

I try to write very fast. I don't revise very much. I write the poem in one sitting. Just let it rip. It's usually over in twenty to forty minutes. I'll go back and tinker with a word or two, change a line for some metrical reason weeks later, but I try to get the whole thing just done.

Billy Collins

Us reaching the moon convinced Gorbachev and other leaders that the Soviet Union couldn't compete with the U.S., so they revised their agenda. But people have short memories.

Buzz Aldrin

When I'm deciding to read a book, I never open to the first chapter, because that's been revised and worked over 88 times. I'll just turn to the middle of the book, to the middle of a chapter, and just read a random page and I'll know right away whether this is the real deal or not.

Carl Hiaasen

Write. Write. Write. Learn how to revise. No story is perfect straight from the keyboard.

Carol Berg

We'll need to revise the tired assumption that people automatically become more conservative as they grow older.

Charles Kennedy

Most of us have heard the saying, 'Cleanliness is next to godliness.' That's a sentiment I value, but another virtue has inspired me to revise that saying. As far as I'm concerned, what's next to godliness is resourcefulness.

Chris Gardner

All our policies must be measured by the extent to which they contribute to job creation. Policies that do not create jobs - or that threaten jobs - must be reviewed and revised.

Cyril Ramaphosa

One of the places the full stop is really being revised in a really fundamental way is on the Internet. You look at the Internet or any instant messaging exchange - anything that is a fast dialogue taking place. People simply do not put full stops in unless they want to make a point.

David Crystal