Jack Woodford - Quotes About Woodford

Quotes About Woodford

• Ray Bradbury, fantasist, prose poet, playwright: "Jack Woodford's Trial and Error was the first book on writing I ever read, at the age of fifteen. He said all the right things and said them clearly. I stayed afloat and got my work done because of him."

• Jerry Pournelle, co-author of Lucifer's Hammer and Inferno and author of A Step Farther Out: "I strongly suspect that I would not have attempted to write for money if I had not read Jack Woodford's books..."

• Piers Anthony: "I have a strong feeling of affinity for Jack Woodford, an ornery cuss who answered his mail and his critics and told it as it was — as I do now. Actually we are nothing like each other, apart from having attractive daughters, when you go beyond the business of writing — but writing is my life, as it was his. Jack Woodford was writing on writing back when I was born — and he still makes more sense than anyone else. His references may be dated now, but his truths are eternal. You want to be a writer, you fool? If Woodford can't discourage you, he'll tell you how to make good. Start with Jack Woodford on Writing, which is a collection of excerpts from his books on the subject. After that you will be able to handle any current reference with appropriate cynicism. He did that for me."

• Robert A. Heinlein: "It pleases me enormously to see dear old Jack Woodford (may his bones rest in peace) given his due. I read Trial and Error in 1939, started writing and did exactly what he said to do, and it works and I've sold it all. Hooray for Woodford."

• Richard A. Lupoff, author of Circumpolar! and Circumsolar!: "I learned from a book by old-timer Jack Woodford how to interweave plot and subplot in a manner that sustains reader interest and suspense for several hundred pages."