Quotes About Author

Sherry is dull, naturally dull; but it must have taken him a great deal of pains to become what we now see him. Such an excess of stupidity, sir, is not in Nature.

Hope is necessary in every condition. The miseries of poverty, sickness, of captivity, would, without this comfort, be insupportable.

My friend was of opinion that when a man of rank appeared in that character [as an author], he deserved to have his merit handsomely allowed.

There is more knowledge of the heart in one letter of Richardson's than in all Tom Jones.

Americans are a race of convicts and ought to be thankful for anything we allow them short of hanging.

Hope itself is a species of happiness, and perhaps, the chief happiness which this world affords.

Hell is paved with good intentions.

The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading, in order to write: a man will turn over half a library to make one book.

Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; truth is not.

no stone. Except for the huge reeds in the marshes, it had no trees for timber. Here, then, was a region with

in classical times as Babylonia, consists of the lower half of Mesopotamia, roughly identical with modern Iraq from north of Baghdad to the Persian

Iraq under the auspices of the University of Pennsylvania.

Society and State in Ancient Mesopotamia (Moscow, 1959; in Russian with English resume).

In appearance, at least, he being on all occasions glad to be at friendship with me, though we hate one another, and know it on both sides.

Lord of Sandwich came in, but whether it be my doubt or no I cannot tell, but I do not find that he made any sign of kindnesse or respect to me, which troubles me more than any thing in the world.

our late maid Nell, who cried for joy to see me,

Do you follow the wrestling? Most people think it's illegal, but you can watch it there. Ruby and Python are on display this evening.

Good writing is clear. Talented writing is energetic. Good writing avoids errors. Talented writing makes things happen in the reader's mind — vividly, forcefully — that good writing, which stops with clarity and logic, doesn't.

I do not say, however, that every delusion or wandering of the mind should be called madness. Erasmus of Rotterdam, The Praise of Folly There

Bear in mind that the novel--no matter how intimate, psychological, or subjective--is always an historical projection of its own time.

Here one page, possibly two, is missing.

Novels were primarily about relationships. … Their popularity lay in that they belied the loneliness of the people who read them, people essentially hypnotized by the machinations of their own consciousness.

But right now I want to answer his question." He turned back to Lorq. "But to tell you—" he walked to the wall and gazed out across the city—"I have to tell you some history. And not what you learned at Causby.

Huh?—well, in these big … Eh, with blood … Eh … blood. The murder victims' blood. That's pretty—you know—grim.