Quote Category

A good essay must have this permanent quality about it; it must draw its curtain round us, but it must be a curtain that shuts us in not out.

Show me a character whose life arouses my curiosity, and my flesh begins crawling with suspense.

Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.

You never know what you will learn till you start writing. Then you discover truths you never knew existed.

In fact, I think for a lot of writers, it’s so hard to be read.

A man’s got to take a lot of punishment to write a really funny book.

I think writers are very anxious.

Getting even is one reason for writing.

I learned never to empty the well of my writing, but always to stop when there was still something there in the deep part of the well, and let it refill at night from the springs that fed it.

For a long period in my life – it lasted about 10 years – I had writer’s block.