A Quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Research and writing are lonely occupations. It is easy to become discouraged in solitary confinement.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Quote Topics

Become Confinement Discouraged Easy Lonely Research Research And Writing Solitary Solitary Confinement Writing

Quote Author

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
American - Judge
March 8, 1841 - March 6, 1935

I did a lot of research on what solitary confinement does to you, how you become acclimated to being surrounded by people again after being by yourself for such a long time. It's really a horrific thing. It's definitely worth considering it as torture. We're just not meant to be in solitary confinement.

Bill Skarsgard

Solitary confinement has been used extensively, it always has. I was in prison for 44 years; it was a normal part of life - the practice of it. They put you in solitary confinement for disciplinary reasons, they put you in solitary confinement to protect you from violence or whatever, and they also put you in solitary confinement just to show you who has got the power ... It's not something new; it's just something that nobody really cared about in the past.

Wilbert Rideau

I try to do as little as possible without looking like an idiot. Research is fun and easy. Writing is hard. So I try not to let the research become an excuse to not do the writing part.

Zachary Lazar

The writing life is essentially one of solitary confinement - if you can't deal with this, you needn't apply.

Will Self

I was having an epiphany. A moment of supreme clarity, leading to what I dubbed a “realization of solitude” that goes like this: I’m lonely. But when I left that girl in the window I was sure I’d never felt more godforsaken in my life. There’s a big difference between being alone and being lonely. And I’m guessing that once you’ve discovered this distinction you can’t go back to solitary confinement without serious emotional repercussions.

Tiffanie DeBartolo

There's a big difference between being alone and being lonely. And I'm guessing that once you've discovered this distinction you can't go back to solitary confinement without serious emotional repercussions.

Tiffanie DeBartolo

Silence comes in two varieties: One that nourishes and comforts; another that chokes, smothers, and isolates. Solitary confinement is the worst kind of imprisonment we can inflict on fellow humans, and if you are forced to keep silent about some dark secret, you live in solitary confinement. Without the bridge of communication connecting you to other human beings, you can’t share your burdens, can’t receive comfort, can’t confirm that you still belong. Silence is the abyss that separates you from hope.

Martha Beck

You do research into specific occupations of the character, with specific behaviorisms that their daily life might give them. You do as much research as you want, as you can. Now that you have such open access to the Internet, it's very easy to do so.

Guy Burnet

To some extent, all authors are a little schizophrenic. We lead most of our lives in solitary confinement, living and breathing the books that we're writing.

Sophie Kinsella

You have to remember that writing itself is so solitary. You start writing because you're lonely.

Sandra Cisneros

They put me in solitary confinement, and although I went on to do 8,755 days of solitary in total, the first two were the hardest. I almost went mad, beating my head against the wall.

Nick Yarris

The artist's task is to become a successful eccentric, a strange but wise duck able to venture out of solitary confinement and mingle among society.

Eric Maisel

Writing is such a solitary thing, so its nice, when Im discouraged, to see people still have such faith in fiction.

Robert Boswell

A prisoner lived in solitary confinement for years. He saw and spoke to no one and his meals were served through an opening in the wall. One day an ant came into his cell. The man contemplated it in fascination as it crawled around the room. He held it in the palm of his hand the better to observe it, gave it a grain or two, and kept it under his tin cup at night. One day it suddenly struck him that it had taken him ten long years of solitary confinement to open his eyes to the loveliness of an ant.