48 quotes
American writer (1896–1940)
“You don't write because you want to say something. You write because you have something to say.”
"It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living."
on Joy
"America is a willingness of the heart."
on Community
"I'm glad it's a girl. And I hope she'll be a fool--that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool."
on Wisdom
"It was always the becoming he dreamed of, never the being."
on Life
"They were stars on this stage, each playing to an audience of two."
on Art
"A phrase began to beat in my ears with a sort of heady excitement: "There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired."
on Ambition
"Writers aren’t people exactly. Or, if they’re any good, they’re a whole lot of people trying so hard to be one person."
on Writing
"Personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures."
on Character
"A man who was aware that there could be no honor and yet had honor, who knew the sophistry of courage and yet was brave."
on Courage
"All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath."
"An artist is someone who can hold two opposing viewpoints and still remain fully functional."
"Writers aren't exactly people, they're a bunch of people trying to be one person."
"The cleverly expressed opposite of any generally accepted idea is worth a fortune to somebody."
"Whenever you feel like criticzing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven´t had the advantages that you've had."
"First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you."
on Addiction
"I became bored - that was all. Boredom, which is another name and a frequent disguise for vitality, became the unconscious motive of all my acts."
on Philosophy
"Work like hell! I had 122 rejection slips before I sold a story."
on Perseverance
"Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat."
on Resilience
"So he tasted the deep pain that is reserved only for the strong, just as he had tasted for a little while the deep happiness."
"One should ... be able to see things as hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise."
on Inspirational
