Terry Pratchett Quotes That Will Inspire You to Write

It’s hard work but it’s fun, too.

Terry Pratchett is my favourite author. I used to get a new Discworld book as a gift every Christmas (once I’d caught up on his back catalogue, jumping as I did on the Discworld bandwagon several years in) and he’s still my go-to option when I don’t have a new book to read.

Sir Terry did not — to my knowledge — write a craft book, so his thoughts and advice on writing are not as well known as, say, Stephen King’s. Indeed, many of the quotes attributed to Pratchett online are excerpts from narration in his books. Written with his impish wit, no doubt, but not things he actually ever said. But his work was both prolific and of high quality, so what he said is worth paying attention to — even if there’s too much writing advice around.

You will see variations of this everywhere — your first draft does not have to be good, it just needs to be finished. For Pratchett, the first draft wasn’t polished brilliance, but just him working out the story. Personally, I struggle to let my first drafts just be bad and fight the urge to edit as I go.

There are plotters — meticulous writers who plan out every last detail before sitting down to write even a word — and there are so-called “pantsers”, anti-plotters who write while flying by the seat of their pants. Judging by this quote, Pratchett was the latter. He knows the start of his story and certain key points within it (the tops of the trees) and maybe even…

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