English writer Holbrook Jackson once bantered “beware of your habits. The better they are, the more surely they will be your undoing.” Jackson was probably referring to habits like drinking, drugs and other vices. He probably also had writers specifically in
“:?
mind.
Every writer is a person of habit. Even the most successful authors have epitomes, peculiarities, superstitions, oddities and beliefs specifically tied to the words they put on the page. Sometimes, those habits are just peculiar and harmless, but occasionally, these fixations can lead to trouble.
Many writing habits and ticks are developed over time and grow stranger with success, but every poet, playwright, and screenwriter on this list firmly believe they wouldn’t be a success without their idiosyncrasies.
Here are ten world-famous writers and the irregular writing routines that fueled their work.
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1 Maya Angelou Rented A Room
Maya Angelou's work is world-renowned and award-winning, and her writing habits are just as fascinating.
Angelou regularly wrote in a bare hotel room which she paid for on a month-by-month basis. She insisted that hotel staff not change the sheets and remove all the art off the walls. She explained in an interview that she would "leave my home at six, and try to be at work by six-thirty. To write, I lie across the bed, so that an elbow is absolutely encrusted at the end, just so rough with callouses."
This she said was necessitated because of her obsession of keeping her house neat and tidy all the time. So according to her when she needed to write she would rent a room in a preferably obscure hotel or motel, with a bible, bottle of sherry, a deck of cards and a dictionary.
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