A Quote by Norman Maclean

I had as yet no notion that life every now and then becomes literature—not for long, of course, but long enough to be what we best remember, and often enough so that what we eventually come to mean by life are those moments when life, instead of going sideways, backwards, forward, or nowhere at all, lines out straight, tense and inevitable, with a complication, climax, and, given some luck, a purgation, as if life had been made and not happened.

Norman Maclean

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Backwards Becomes Been Best Climax Come Complication Course Enough Eventually Every Forward Given Going Had Happened Inevitable Instead Life Lines Literature Long Luck Made Mean Moments Notion Now Now And Then Nowhere Often Out Remember Sideways Some Straight Tense Then Those

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Norman Maclean
American - Author
December 23, 1902 - August 2, 1990

...life every now and then becomes literature...as if life had been made and not happened.

Norman Maclean

I mean, there's little enough in this life, really, and you only find it worth living for the odd moments, and if you think you're going to have those odd moments again, then it makes life wonderful and have a meaning.

Anthony Burgess

My life has been like all the lives, long and hard and full of sadness and confusion and horror, a frightening, difficult dream punctuated by brief moments of joy. And as is the case with all people's lives, the moments of joy are never often enough and never long enough.

James Frey

I've come across enough successful people now to know that the best in whatever walk of life, they're the ones who just work the hardest. I realized that if I want to be the best and fulfill my potential, I'm going to have to do the same thing. And for those who are lucky enough to be born with a gift and then choose to work the hardest-I mean, that's the combination.

Rory McIlroy

I'll wager there isn't a human being on earth who doesn't believe in luck, however rational they pretend to be in public life. In reality, most of human life is luck - and, of course, its darker, more prevalent opposite. One only has to live long enough to experience both.

Lawrence Osborne

I often think that eventually I'd love to do some papers... my correspondence if life calms down a bit, but I think I'd do history or English literature... I've had enough of journos.

Brooke Fraser

There is no difference in quality between a life lived forward and a life lived backwards, she thinks. She had come to love this backward life. It was, after all, the only life she had.

Gabrielle Zevin

How did it happen that now he could see everything so clearly. Something had given him leave to live in the present. Not once in his entire life had he come to rest in the quiet center of himself but had forever cast himself from some dark past he could not remember to a future that did not exist. Not once had he been present for his life. So his life had passed like a dream. Is it possible for people to miss their lives the way one can miss a plane?

Walker Percy

Life was resumed, and anxious living blew away as if it had not been. I could not breathe deep enough or long enough. It was a return to happiness.

Sarah Orne Jewett

Prescription for Life-long Happiness: Purpose enough for satisfaction; Work enough for sustenance; Sanity enough to know when to play and rest; Wealth enough for basic needs; Affection enough to like many and love a few; Self-respect enough to love yourself; Charity enough to give to others in need; Courage enough to face difficulties; Creativity enough to solve problems; Humor enough to laugh at will; Hope enough to expect an interesting tomorrow; Gratitude enough to appreciate what you have; Health enough to enjoy life for all its worth.

Ernie J Zelinski

And I saw that all my life I had known that this was going to happen, and that I'd been afraid for a long time, I'd been afraid for a long time. There's fear, of course, with everybody. But now it had grown, it had grown gigantic; it filled me and it filled the whole world.

Jean Rhys

Maybe all the secrets of life were written on the surface of leaves, waiting to be translated. If I touched them long enough, I might be given some information no one else had.

Silas House

I think what is probably hard for people to imagine is how wrapped up the 17 years' work on Harry Potter is with what was going on in my life at the time. I was mourning the loss of this world that I had written for so long and loved so much. I was also mourning the retreat it had been from - from ordinary life, which it has been. And it forced me to look back at 17 years of my life and remember things.

J. K. Rowling

Oh if life were made of moments Even now and then a bad one--! But if life were only moments, Then you'd never know you had one.

Stephen Sondheim

He'd done as he'd pleased and even had often enjoyed long runs of luck where he hadn't been caught. But the luckiest moment of his life had been being caught.

Nora Roberts

It's a long story, my life, growing up with my dad, my mom when she died, everything. I had bad moments in my life, my dad going to prison, I had nothing, and that's where I got my motivation.

Serge Ibaka

A Quote by Norman Maclean

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