A Quote by Raymond Chandler

One would think a writer would be happy here — if a writer is ever happy anywhere. — © Raymond Chandler
One would think a writer would be happy here — if a writer is ever happy anywhere.
There's this quote by a writer, Emil Cioran, he's a Romanian writer. He says that you should only put things in books that you would never dare to say to people in real life. So there is that feeling of acute embarrassment, or that you've been too revealing. I think it's some kind of survival mechanism where I never think of the reader, ever. Because then I would start censoring myself.
I would be happy to be labeled as a writer of offbeat stories. I don't know how to do anything else.
I love Google. I was there for 13 years, and if you told me I'd be as happy anywhere else, I would've probably doubted it. But I am as happy, if not happier, at Yahoo.
I really wanted to be allowed to the [writer's] table. So it makes me happy to be at the table. It sounds a little shallow, but if I imagine the shadow life, where I didn't get that chance, and all the ways my negative inclinations would have bloomed if I hadn't gotten the attention, but also the creative outlet ... I'm not actually that happy. I have multiplicities. My happiness blooms and it wilts.
I think the biggest advice I can offer is don't just pick one story and stop, write as much as you can, as many stories as you can. The best thing about being a writer is, a writer's craft is nearly perfect because a writer can go anywhere and do his craft.
The weirdest thing to me is that magazines would never do this for their writers. They would never hire a writer who writes for another magazine; they want to have their own stable of writers. Newsweek would never hire a TIME writer, and TIME would never hire a Newsweek writer - but they would both hire the same photographer to shoot a cover for them.
You cannot teach creativity - how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be.
I think of myself as a writer with a sense of humour rather than a comedy writer. Happy to tell a story with lots of jokes in it - I wouldn't know how to do jokes without the story.
I don't think I knew I would be a writer. I wanted to become a writer, and I tried to write.
If you don't put 99 percent of yourself into the writing, there will be no publishing career. There's the writer and there's the author. The author - you don't ever think about the author. Just think about the writer. So my advice would be, find a way to not care - easier said than done.
I'm not a sketch writer. I know what I am: I have a sensitive comedic sensibility. What turns me on is subtle neurosis. That's my game. I'm not an action writer or a thriller writer and I'm not a sketch writer. I don't pretend to be those things. Then it would not be fun. Then you are in a space where this is painful.
If AOL had ever ordered me to remove a piece of content from the site for any reason, I would have immediately written about it and disclosed the situation to our readers. And if I had ever ordered a writer to remove content, I would have expected that writer to have done the same to me.
I want a happy marriage and whatever it takes to achieve that. But I think the main prerequisite would have to be respect. He would have to respect me and vice-versa. And, that would be more important than being in love. I think respect really goes a long way. And he would have to keep me happy. And he'd have to be very, very, secure.
So often, we blame other people when, really, the problem is right down in here. I'm not happy. I don't know what's wrong. If I just had another job, I could be happy. If I just get married, I would be happy. Well if I just wasn't married, I would be happy. Well, if I just had some kids, I'll be happy. I'll be happy when these kids finally grow up and get out of here. If I had a bigger house, I would be happy. Well, I got a big house. Now if I just had a maid to clean, I'd be happy. Well, now if I just had a maid I could get along with better, I'd be happy.
When I was a young writer if you went to a party and told somebody you were a science-fiction writer you would be insulted. They would call you Flash Gordon all evening, or Buck Rogers.
You never know if you're a writer. You can't trust it. If you woke up and said, "I'm a writer," it would be gone. You wouldn't see anything for miles - even the dust would be running away.
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