A Quote by Edward M. Lerner

Too much detail can bog down any story. Enough with the history of gunpowder, the geology of Hawaii, the processes of whaling, and cactus and tumbleweed.

Edward M. Lerner

Quote Topics

Any Cactus Detail Down Enough Geology Gunpowder Hawaii History Much Processes Story The History Of Too Too Much Whaling

Quote Author

Edward M. Lerner
American - Author
Born: 1949

I'm always oscillating between if I should sprinkle more gunpowder or less. But if I put too much gunpowder, there may be holes throughout the silk. If not enough, the power and energy would not be shown.

Cai Guo-Qiang

Geology, perhaps more than any other department of natural philosophy, is a science of contemplation. It requires no experience or complicated apparatus, no minute processes upon the unknown processes of matter. It demands only an enquiring mind and senses alive to the facts almost everywhere presented in nature. And as it may be acquired without much difficulty, so it may be improved without much painful exertion.

Humphry Davy

History is preoccupied with fundamental processes of change. If you are allergic to these processes, you abandon history and take cover in the social sciences. Today anthropology, sociology, etc, flourish. History is sick. But then our society too is sick

Edward Hallett Carr

As a general habit and general tendency, I prefer not to bog a piece down with a great number of transitory, contemporary references, because in the end, I'm concerned, not in an abstract way, but an actual way, with creating a world which has a universality to it - even though what goes on is made up of texture and detail, contemporary detail.

Mike Leigh

Back in 1980, whale watching surpassed whaling as an industry. Now it's worth about four times as much. Whale watching provides far, far more jobs to people than whaling ever did. Whale watching has become an ally in the fight to end whaling.

Paul Watson

The writing process for a short story feels more like field geology, where you keep turning the thing over and over, noting its qualities in detail, hammering at it, putting it near flame, pouring different acids on it, and then finally you figure out what it is, or you just give up and mount it on a ring and have an awkward chunky piece of jewelry that seems weirdly dominating but that you for some reason like. I could be wrong about field geology here.

Rivka Galchen

It is too often forgotten that when the Europeans gained enough maritime skills and gunpowder to conquer most of the world, they not only colonized the bulk of the world's people but they colonized the interpretation of history itself. Human history was rewritten to favor them at the expense of other people. The roots of modern racism can be traced to this conquest and colonization.

John Henrik Clarke

In history we studied the bog man. Do you remember the bog man? I was absolutely fascinated by this. When something brings the past into sharp focus as a child it creates an indelible impression.

Mark Bonnar

I think that when memoir goes wrong, it goes wrong from too much memory, too much detail. It's about clearing all that away and just getting to the story.

Tara Westover

The history of Hawaii may be seen as a story of arrivals.

Susanna Moore

I look for ambiguous messages to illustrate...I like some detail but not too much detail.

Sophie Blackall

I was very lucky. I was just finishing my PhD at Cambridge in 1981. This opportunity came up because whaling was drawing to an end. There was the prospect of a moratorium, and one of the arguments that was brought up, especially by Japanese whalers, was that, if we didn't have whaling, we would know nothing of whales. All the science depends on having dead animals, they argued, so that's one of the benefits of the whaling industry.

Hal Whitehead

And I find chopsticks frankly distressing. Am I alone in thinking it odd that a people ingenious enough to invent paper, gunpowder, kites and any number of other useful objects, and who have a noble history extending back 3,000 years haven't yet worked out that a pair of knitting needles is no way to capture food?

Bill Bryson

I usually have a general idea of where the story is going, but I try to avoid planning in too much detail. The best endings are those that emerge only after I've thought long and hard about the various ways the story might end. Then I choose the ending that seems surprising yet somehow inevitable.

Karl Iagnemma

One reason I chose gunpowder is that I had the good luck in my environment to be exposed to gunpowder. The other reason is I was always looking for a visual language that goes beyond the boundary of nations, and so I found gunpowder.

Cai Guo-Qiang

Human history has become too much a matter of dogma taught by 'professionals' in ivory towers as though it's all fact. Actually, much of human history is up for grabs. The further back you go, the more that the history that's taught in the schools and universities begins to look like some kind of faerie story.

Graham Hancock

A Quote by Edward M. Lerner

Quote Topics

Quote Author

Related Quotes

Related Authors