Something to Think About

I love quotes of all kinds. I have a really bad habit of reading books with a pen and underlining sentences that sound especially good. My daughter wants me to go through all my books and get rid of what I've read or will never read. I'm trying. So... while browsing I came across a book called Final Analysis by Lois Gould. It's a book from the late 70s and I remember it made quite an impression on me. I underlined alot. Funny thing--reading over what I'd underlined when I was in my 20s, well, the 60+ year old me can't relate. I don't know whether to laugh or cry about that--but I'm keeping the book!

Here are some great quotes to think about:

I hate the term "mystery". That's not what I write. I think the Scarpetta novels are much more character-driven than an average puzzle solver. Writing should be like a pane of glass - there's another world on the other side and your vision carries you there, but you're not aware of having passed through a barrier to get there. ~Patricia Cornwall

I don't know much about creative writing programs. But they're not telling the truth if they don't teach, one, that writing is hard work, and, two, that you have to give up a great deal of life, your personal life, to be a writer. ~Doris Lessing

The good writing of any age has always been the product of someone's neurosis, and we'd have a mighty dull literature if all the writers that came along were a bunch of happy chuckleheads. ~William Styron

Publishing is a very mysterious business. It is hard to predict what kind of sale or reception a book will have, and advertising seems to do very little good. ~Thomas Wolfe

The profession of book writing makes horse racing seem like a solid, stable business.
~John Steinbeck

Coleridge was a drug addict. Poe was an alcoholic. Marlowe was stabbed by a man whom he was treacherously trying to stab. Pope took money to keep a woman's name out of a satire; then wrote a piece so that she could still be recognized anyhow. Chatterton killed himself. Byron was accused of incest. Do you still want to be a writer -and if so, why? ~Bennett Cerf, co-founder of Random House

When a book leaves your hands, it belongs to God. He may use it to save a few souls or to try a few others, but I think that for the writer to worry is to take over God’s business. ~Flannery O’Connor