When you read a short story, you come out a little more aware and a little more in love with the world around you.

George Saunders

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Saunders

And the day came when the risk to remain closed in the bud became more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

Elizabeth Appell

https://readelizabeth.com/

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.

Haruki Murakami

(from What I Talk About When I Talk About Running)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruki_Murakami

A short story…can be held in the mind all in one piece. It’s less like a building than a fiendish device. Every bit of it must be cunningly made and crafted to fit together perfectly and without waste so that it can perform its task with absolute precision…The ideal short story is like a knife – strongly made, well balanced and with an absolute minimum of moving parts.

Michael Swanwick

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Swanwick

(Hollywood’s) conception of what makes a good picture is still as juvenile as its treatment of writing talent is insulting and degrading.

Raymond Chandler

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Chandler

If novel writing is like swimming in the sea, then adapting is like swimming in the bath.

William Boyd

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Boyd_(writer)

Creativity could be described as letting go of certainties.

Gail Sheehy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gail_Sheehy

It’s possible in a poem or short story, to write about commonplace things and objects using commonplace but precise language, and to endow these things – a chair, a window curtain, a fork, a stone, a woman’s earring – with immense, even startling power.

Raymond Carver

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Carver

Find the key emotion, this may be all you need to know to find your short story.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._Scott_Fitzgerald

Telling yourself you have all the time in the world, all the money in the world, all the colours in the palette, anything you want – that just kills creativity.

Jack White

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_White