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

I was never one to go up to someone as a five- or six-year-old and say, "Hello, my name's Paul, will you be my friend?" But I found if I did an impression of the PE teacher or whatever and people laughed, then they did like me, and so then they started talking to me, rather than me making the initial overture and then maybe being rebuffed. ~Paul Merton
#quotes #paul-merton #teaching

Fame is a magnifying glass. ~English Proverb
#proverbs #english-proverbs #fame

If you are a patient in one moment of anger, you will escape a hundred days of sorrow. ~Chinese Proverb
#proverbs #chinese-proverbs #patience

Never write a letter while you are angry. ~Chinese Proverb
#proverbs #chinese-proverb #anger

I just can't sleep tonight knowing that things ain't right. ~Justin Bieber
#quotes #justin-bieber

What is an adult? A child blown up by age. ~Simone de Beauvoir
#quotes #simone-de-beauvoir #children #adults #life

There was something frantic in their blooming, as if they knew that frost was near and then the bitter cold. They'd lived through all the heat and noise and stench of summertime, and now each widely opened flower was like a triumphant cry, "We will, we will make seed before we die." ~Harriette Simpson Arnow
#quotes #harriette-simpson-arnow

Fine feathers make fine birds. ~English Proverb
#proverbs #english-proverbs #beauty #harship

But that's typical of me. "This is going to end in tears," I tell myself every time I balance a cup of coffee on the upholstered arm of the chair I'm sitting on. And then, lo and behold, the cup topples and even before it lands, I tell myself, "Told me so!" Not to spell out, or spill out, one of the metaphors of my life, but I always do the stupid thing and then I do it again. I never learn. ~Patricia Marx
#quotes #patricia-marx #weeping #stupidity

In reading a novel, any novel, we have to know perfectly well that the whole thing is nonsense, and then, while reading, believe every word of it. Finally, when we're done with it, we may find, if it's a good novel, that we're a bit different from what we were before we read it, that we have changed a little. But it's very hard to say just what we learned, how we were changed. ~Ursula K. Le Guin
#quotes #ursula-k-le-guin #reading #novels

Bygone troubles are good to tell. ~Yiddish Proverb
#proverbs #yiddish-proverbs #adversity

To laugh is to risk appearing a fool. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental. To reach out to another is to risk involvement. To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self. To place your ideas and dreams before a crowd is to risk their loss. To love is to risk not being loved in return. To hope is to risk pain. To try is to risk failure. But risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. ~William Arthur Ward
#quotes #william-arthur-ward #risk

The miracle is not to fly in the air, or to walk on the water, but to walk on the earth. ~Chinese Proverb
#proverbs #chinese-proverbs #life

There is no burnt rice to a hungry person. ~Philippine Proverb
#proverbs #philippine-proverbs

Ideas for gadgets for the disabled were coming into my head so fast they seemed to be arriving from somewhere outside of me, beamed down by an unremitting force. I had little control over them, or their flow. I would wake up in the middle of the night. A blinding flash of an idea would rouse me from my bed and I'd rush down to my workshop to have a go at it before the inspiration dimmed. ~Trevor Baylis
#quotes #trevor-baylis #inspiration #ideas #night

We get stuck in old thought and behavior patterns that may have been effective when we were twelve months or twelve years old, but now only serve to hold us back. And, while those around us may have no problem correcting our minor flaws, they let the big ones slide, because it would mean attacking who we are. ~Neil Strauss
#quotes #neil-strauss #childhood #behavior

Even the smallest of stars shines in the darkness. ~Swedish Proverb
#proverbs #swedish-proverbs #stars

The more you eat, the less flavor; the less you eat, the more flavor. ~Chinese Proverb
#proverbs #chinese-proverbs #food #wisdom

It has become quite a common proverb that in wine there is truth. (Vino Veritas) ~Pliny the Elder
#quotes #pliny-the-elder #vino-veritas #alcohol #truth

A good laugh and a long sleep are two best cures in the doctor's book. ~Irish Proverb
#proverbs #irish-proverbs #laughing #medicine

Coffee has two virtues: it is wet and warm. ~Dutch Proverb
#proverbs #dutch-proverbs #coffee

It is better to sit down than to stand, it is better to lie down than to sit, but death is the best of all. ~Indian Proverb
#proverbs #indian-proverbs #death

Good advice is often annoying, bad advice never. ~French Proverb
#proverbs #french-proverbs #advice

A bird in the hand is worth two in a bush. ~English Proverb
#proverbs #english-proverbs