If a secret history of books could be written, and the author's private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader! ~William Makepeace Thackeray
#quotes #william-makepeace-thackeray #writing #history #books

I don't believe in the clash of cultures. The culture is one. The culture is a ring off the same chain. Picasso was very much influenced by the African arts, and he influenced a whole other generation of artists. So everything influences everything. ~Marjane Satrapi
#quotes #marjane-satrapi #picasso #culture #generations #influence

I believe that how you feel is very important to how you look; that healthy equals beautiful. ~Victoria Principal
#quotes #victoria-principal #feelings #health #beauty

Psychologists maintain that the dizzy feeling of intense romantic love lasts only about 18 months to at best three years. ~Helen Fisher
#quotes #helen-fisher #love #romance #psychology

I am a fervent foe of water pollution, whether it is our own Hudson River or Philadelphia's tap water. ~Gore Vidal
#quotes #gore-vidal #hudson-river #environment #pollution #water

The mind of the polyglot is a very particular thing, and scientists are only beginning to look closely at how acquiring a second language influences learning, behavior and the very structure of the brain itself. ~Jeffrey Kluger
#quotes #jeffrey-kluger #language

Very often I'll find out at the end of a book what I put in at the beginning. A sort of process of elimination and discovery in one. ~Jonathan Carroll
#quotes #jonathan-carroll #books #process

A world of few choices, whether in jeans or mates, is a world in which individual differences become sources of alienation, unhappiness, even self-loathing. If no jeans fit, you'll feel uncomfortable or inferior. If no housing developments reflect your taste for unique architecture, you'll write screeds against philistine mass culture. ~Virginia Postrel
#quotes #virginia-postrel #jeans #society

She wore far too much rouge last night and not quite enough clothes. That is always a sign of despair in a woman. ~Oscar Wilde
#quotes #oscar-wilde #fashion

Most people don't see what's going on around them. That's my principal message to writers: "For God's sake, keep your eyes open. Notice what's going on around you." ~William S. Burroughs
#quotes #william-s-burroughs #writing

If you wait for tomorrow, tomorrow comes. If you do not wait for tomorrow, tomorrow comes. ~Senegalese Proverb
#proverbs #senegalese-proverbs #future

In many ways, theatre is more rewarding for a writer. I used to think it was like painting a wall - that when the play is finished, it's done; but now I realise it's more like gardening; you plant the thing, then you have to constantly tend it. You're part of a thing that's living. ~Lee Hall
#quotes #lee-hall #gardening #theatre

Every young girl wants to be a princess. Then, when you find a real-life one, it's very easy to imagine yourself in that role. ~Lauren Willig
#quotes #lauren-willig #princess

The style developed over decades, really, but I started out writing pretty traditional stories, then became impatient. It was a writer named Russell Edson who showed me that one could write in any way at all. ~Lydia Davis
#quotes #lydia-davis #russell-edson #style #writing #stories

If a man does not tell everything to his spiritual father, then his path is crooked and does not lead to the Kingdom of Heaven. But the path of one who tells everything leads directly to the Kingdom of Heaven. ~Silouan the Athonite
#quotes #silouan-the-athonite #christianity

My family is involved and my wife Brenda is a great, great writer. She helps me with the writing of everything and also sings with me. I owe a lot to Brenda. ~Rick Derringer
#quotes #rick-derringer #writing #family #helping

Stories are the best democracy we have. We are allowed to become the other we never dreamed we could be. ~Colum McCann
#quotes #colum-mccann #democracy #stories

You have to be a model and multifaceted, but there's not a lot of ways for a model to be multifaceted because the actresses took all the covers. ~Kim Alexis
#quotes, #kim-alexis #entertainment #acting

I try to write like the writers I admire, I rip them off in form. It comes from George Strait and Merle Haggard records, and country music in general is really good at that, the twisted phrase. So I'm always looking for that angle in my own work. ~Brad Paisley
#quotes #brad-paisley #writing #music

Just the type of music that was around at the same time as I was writing. Some of it was wicked, definitely. But there was just one direction which I thought could be pushed that no one was pushing. ~Tom Jenkinson
#quotes #tom-jenkinson #squarepusher #one-direction #writing #music

Sometimes I go about pitying myself, and all the while I am being carried across the sky by beautiful clouds. ~Ojibwe Proverb
#proverbs #ojibwe-proverbs #self #beauty

[The raindrops] played across the coast all through the night, until the soft new day shrugged itself awake, tried on amethyst and lavender for a while, and finally decided on pale yellow. ~Gary D. Schmidt
#quotes #gary-d-schmidt #night

Offers for me to play dances, society parties, even churches, were now coming in regularly. For most dates I was paid the sum of one dollar per hour, and they always tipped me at the end of the night. ~Mary Lou Williams
#quotes #mary-lou-williams #career

I don't usually think of my writing as a "challenge" because I enjoy the process so much. I suppose that's what's helped me to avoid "writer's block" all these years. ~Melody Carlson
#quotes #melody-carlson #writing #process

You can trust the promise of this opening. Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning. That is at one with your life's desire. ~John O'Donohue
#quotes #john-o-donohue #desire