I get up in the morning, torture a typewriter until it screams, then stop.

Clarence Budington Kelland (1881–1964) was a prolific American popular novelist and short-story writer, long associated with mass-circulation magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post. The quip about “torture a typewriter until it screams” is typically cited as one of his wry remarks on the daily discipline of professional writing—presenting authorship less as inspiration than as routine labor. It reflects the early–mid 20th-century world of commercial fiction, in which writers were expected to produce steadily to meet magazine and publisher deadlines, often treating writing as a regular job with set hours rather than an occasional artistic impulse.

The line uses comic exaggeration to demystify writing. By casting the typewriter as a victim that “screams,” Kelland frames composition as strenuous, even adversarial work—an act of forcing words onto the page through persistence. The final “then stop” underscores a pragmatic, workmanlike approach: writing is something you do until you’ve done your day’s share, not a romantic trance. The joke also hints at the emotional friction of drafting—false starts, revisions, and the pressure to produce—while implying that productivity comes from showing up and working, not waiting for inspiration.