Top 1200 Quotes & Sayings by Famous Writers - Page 20

Corruption is worse than prostitution. The latter might endanger the morals of an individual, the former invariably endangers the morals of the entire country.

I wake up very early in the morning. I like to start in the dark, and I never work at night, because my brain is evaporated by 4 P.M.

Once a person has all the things they need to live, everything else is entertainment.

We are so much the victims of abstraction that with the Earth in flames we can barely rouse ourselves to wander across the room and look at the thermostat.

The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.

Life is a canvas of many strokes where shades from different palettes meet into a picture so concrete that some forget it is their own, so become framed themselves.

To be content with little is hard; to be content with much, impossible.

May you live all the days of your life.

Hope is tomorrow's veneer over today's disappointment.

Storytelling is my passion, and it rises from a love of reading.

There's a weird cloud around you when you're recognizable. It was a brief window for me. I think you have to have a pathological need for attention of any type, negative or positive, to thrive in that kind of situation. And I only want compliments.

As far as I can see, it's not important that we have free will, just as long as we have the illusion of free will to stop us going mad.

Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it.

Ah, the power of two. There's nothing quite like it. Especially when it comes to paying utility bills, parenting, cooking elaborate meals, purchasing a grown-up bed, jumping rope and lifting heavy machinery. The world favours pairs. Who wants to waste the wood building an ark for singletons?

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.

The short story is an imploding universe. It has all the boil of energy inside it. A novel has shrapnel going all over the place. You can have a mistake in a novel. A short story has to be perfect.

The best thing that ever happened to me is that nothing happened in writing. I ended up working for engineering companies, and that's where I found my material, in the everyday struggle between capitalism and grace. Being broke and tired, you don't come home your best self.

It's been a while since I've written a novel aimed at the adult market, but I never sit down and say to myself, 'Okay, now I'm going to write something for us old folks.' I get gripped by an idea, and I go where the idea takes me.

If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don't just stick there scowling at the problem. But don't make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people's words will pour in where your lost words should be.

Pity the nation that has to silence its writers for speaking their minds.

I want to do with you what spring does with cherry trees.

I think many people need, even require, a narrative version of their life. I seem to be one of them. Writing memoir is, in some ways, a work of wholeness.

Make it a habit to tell people thank you. To express your appreciation, sincerely and without the expectation of anything in return. Truly appreciate those around you, and you'll soon find many others around you. Truly appreciate life, and you'll find that you have more of it.

He who can destroy a thing, can control a thing.

When I was a screenwriter, I was doing it for mercenary reasons.

History offers us vicarious experience. It allows the youngest student to possess the ground equally with his elders; without a knowledge of history to give him a context for present events, he is at the mercy of every social misdiagnosis handed to him.

Insanity is knowing that what you're doing is completely idiotic, but still, somehow, you just can't stop it.

Our thoughts create our reality - where we put our focus is the direction we tend to go.

That's the great thing about 'The West Wing:' you really felt like you were in the thick of it.

I struggled to learn basic skills, get a grip on markets, find my own unique voice, create story lines and come up to speed with the industry. I struggled for ten years before having any success.

Sunday clears away the rust of the whole week.

Naked is the best disguise.

We cast a shadow on something wherever we stand.

Love begins with an image; lust with a sensation.

I don't have children that I've lost in a bitter custody dispute. But I see an enormous wound in kids due to a lack of their dads.

Reading is No. 1 - I have to read, or I can't write.

We are the United States of Amnesia, which is encouraged by a media that has no desire to tell us the truth about anything, serving their corporate masters who have other plans to dominate us.

Housework never really bothered me... what bothered me about it later was that it was expected to be your life... when you're a housewife, you are constantly interrupted. You have no space in your life. It isn't the fact that you do the laundry.

Sex in space is not just a good idea, it's survival.

Life is ours to be spent, not to be saved.

I give each book however long it needs to be the best I can make it.

People are always fascinated by infidelity because, in the end - whether we've had direct experience or not - there's part of you that knows there's absolutely no more piercing betrayal. People are undone by it.

Parenting is no sport for perfectionists.

I wanted to be the moron of the family, because morons seemed to have more fun, more freedom and more personality.

In terms of target audience, who cares what a middle-aged guy like me wants; most mainstream are not catering to me at all.

It is difficult to say who do you the most mischief, enemies with the worst intentions, or friends with the best.

Forging meaning is about changing yourself. Building identity is about changing the world.

Books written by boys are given very different treatment to those written by girls: they're even given very different covers. People also expect, in this YA-booming world, girls to be less experimental than boys: girls are achieving a lot of success, but they're confined.

It is as impossible to withhold education from the receptive mind, as it is impossible to force it upon the unreasoning.

When you invent the ship, you also invent the shipwreck; when you invent the plane you also invent the plane crash; and when you invent electricity, you invent electrocution...Every technology carries its own negativity, which is invented at the same time as technical progress.

God's promises are all on condition of humble obedience.

Those who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by others doing it.

Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy.

Definition of Statistics: The science of producing unreliable facts from reliable figures.

Society is composed of two great classes those who have more dinners than appetite, and those who have more appetite than dinners.

I'm sick of just liking people. I wish to God I could meet somebody I could respect.

Which is - you know, like check it out, I'm pretty young, I'm only about 40 years old. I still have maybe another four decades of work left in me. And it's exceedingly likely that anything I write from this point forward is going to be judged by the world as the work that came after the freakish success of my last book, right?

Wikipedia is so dangerous.

There's no shame in crawling when one can't walk.

Love is always being given where it is not required.