A Quote by Emma Donoghue

You're meant to have an unhappy childhood to be a writer, but there's a lot to be said for a very happy one that just lets you get on with it.

Emma Donoghue

Quote Topics

Childhood Get Happy Happy Childhood Just Lets Lot Meant Said Unhappy Unhappy Childhood Very Very Happy Writer

Quote Author

Emma Donoghue
Irish - Novelist
Born: October 24, 1969

You're meant to have an unhappy childhood to be a writer, but there's a lot to be said for a very happy one that just let's you get on with it.

Emma Donoghue

I think it's not inaccurate to say that I had a perfectly happy childhood during which I was very unhappy.

Joss Whedon

I was such a sullen, angry, sad kid. I'm sure there are writers who have had happy childhoods, but what are you going to write about? No ghosts, no fear. I'm very happy that I had an unhappy and uncomfortable childhood.

Isabel Allende

I had a very happy childhood, which is unsuitable if you're going to be an Irish writer.

Maeve Binchy

Your emotions are meant to fluctuate, just like your blood pressure is meant to fluctuate. It's a system that's supposed to move back and forth, between happy and unhappy. That's how the system guides you through the world.

Daniel Gilbert

Mice: What is the best early training for a writer? Y.C.: An unhappy childhood.

Ernest Hemingway

So you're trying to make her happy despite the fact that the reason she's unhappy in the first place is you," said Simon, not very kindly. "That seems contradictory, doesn't it?" "Love is a contradiction," said Jace.

Cassandra Clare

When you get up in the morning, you have two choices - either to be happy or to be unhappy. Just choose to be happy

Norman Vincent Peale

I've never disguised the fact that I wasn't happy in teaching. But the reason was that I wanted to do comedy. I would have been a very unhappy security guard or a very unhappy greengrocer.

Greg Davies

They say that childhood forms us, that those early influences are the key to everything. Is the peace of the soul so easily won? Simply the inevitable result of a happy childhood. What makes childhood happy? Parental harmony? Good health? Security? Might not a happy childhood be the worst possible preparation for life? Like leading a lamb to the slaughter.

Josephine Hart

My mother was a schoolteacher and very, very encouraging. She understood what it meant when I said I wanted to be a writer; both me and my brother wrote.

Derek Walcott

I think you never forget your childhood, whether it was happy or unhappy.

Marcel Carne

Normally we will say we are happy or we are unhappy. I have met some people who told Me, "Oh we went to that Guru we were very happy." I said, "You could be happy in the pub also. What is happiness?" Happiness is not the way to judge any one, neither unhappiness. Unhappiness comes to you through this super ego and happiness through this ego. But joy has no double face, joy is joy. In joy, you witness, you witness the whole thing. And when you are joyous you feel the whole thing, the joy itself coming on you like grace falling on to you. It's so beautiful that you just get lost into it.

Nirmala Srivastava

I'd love to be on a TV series someday, but I believe you get the jobs that you're meant to get. If the job that I'm meant to get is another musical or another play or film or TV show, I'm just happy to keep working.

Stark Sands

The unhappy person resents it when you try to cheer him up, because that means he has to stop dwelling on himself and start paying attention to the universe. Unhappiness is the ultimate form of self-indulgence. When you're unhappy, you get to pay a lot of attention to yourself. You get to take yourself oh so very seriously.