"The desire to write grows with writing"
About this Quote
Erasmus is smuggling a psychological truth into a line that sounds almost like a proverb: writing isn’t powered by a stable reservoir of “inspiration,” it’s powered by momentum. The sentence is built like a little engine. “Desire” suggests something inward and volatile, but Erasmus tethers it to a very plain mechanism: practice. Not reading, not talking about writing, not waiting for the right mood - writing. The form mirrors the message: a loop where the action feeds the appetite.
The subtext is quietly polemical. In Erasmus’s humanist world, learning was being wrestled out of cloisters and scholastic hair-splitting into a culture of letters - correspondence, essays, translations, public argument. Saying the urge grows with the act is a rebuke to both the timid student and the pious moralist who treats composition as vanity. It’s also a strategy for self-governance: if you can’t command your feelings, you can at least command your habits, and your feelings may follow.
Context matters: Erasmus lived inside an early print ecosystem that was suddenly hungry for text and quick to amplify it. Writing more didn’t just make you better; it made you visible, legible, employable. “Desire” here isn’t purely romantic; it’s also ambition, discipline, and the pleasure of joining a republic of letters. The line works because it demystifies creativity without flattening it: the spark is real, but it’s manufactured by friction.
The subtext is quietly polemical. In Erasmus’s humanist world, learning was being wrestled out of cloisters and scholastic hair-splitting into a culture of letters - correspondence, essays, translations, public argument. Saying the urge grows with the act is a rebuke to both the timid student and the pious moralist who treats composition as vanity. It’s also a strategy for self-governance: if you can’t command your feelings, you can at least command your habits, and your feelings may follow.
Context matters: Erasmus lived inside an early print ecosystem that was suddenly hungry for text and quick to amplify it. Writing more didn’t just make you better; it made you visible, legible, employable. “Desire” here isn’t purely romantic; it’s also ambition, discipline, and the pleasure of joining a republic of letters. The line works because it demystifies creativity without flattening it: the spark is real, but it’s manufactured by friction.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Erasmus, Desiderius. (2026, January 15). The desire to write grows with writing. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-desire-to-write-grows-with-writing-54999/
Chicago Style
Erasmus, Desiderius. "The desire to write grows with writing." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-desire-to-write-grows-with-writing-54999/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"The desire to write grows with writing." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-desire-to-write-grows-with-writing-54999/. Accessed 18 Feb. 2026.
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