Literature Quotes

I have written every one of my novels to convince somebody of something.

You don't know whether he's thought through how this is going to affect the Middle East.

It's not the sentiments of men which make history but their actions.

Then the administration tied it in to the regional dispute between Israel and its enemies, as if that's about international terrorism. No, it's not.

I'm not terribly happy about rock and roll. Certain rock music is uninspiring, numbing; it makes you feel like an idiot.

I don't know why his lawyers didn't tell him, 'You don't have to answer any questions about your private life, Mr. President. Let them sue you. Take the heat. You don't have to answer.'

Often with good sentiments we produce bad literature.

It is with noble sentiments that bad literature gets written.

But it's for every writer to decide his own pace, and the pace varies with the writer and the work

My only fantasy about writing was that in my old days, after directing many masterpieces, I would write my memoirs.

It doesn't serve an American interest. It really doesn't really serve Israeli interests - it serves the interests of the political party that's getting the votes of the settlers on the West Bank.

The horror of the Twentieth Century was the size of each new event, and the paucity of its reverberation.

There's always been anger in the making of music or literature or dance.

You can count on Scandinavian literature for a certain kind of darkness, a modern mythic style.

The executive branch maneuvered this result deftly.

I teach literature. That's easy for me. Take someone else's work and talk about it.

So I'm not a Southern writer in the commonly held sense of the term, like Faulkner or Eudora Welty, who took the South for their entire literary environment and subject matter.

There is no just and serene criticism as yet.

The world was not created once and for all time for each of us individually. There are added to it in the course of our life things of which we have never had any suspicion.

As for literature, thefts cannot harm it, while the lapse of ages augments its value

I love the tradition of Dickens, where even the most minor walk-on characters are twitching and particular and alive.

All men are not created equal but should be treated as though they were under the law.

When my babe was born, they said it was premature. It weighed only four pounds; but God let it live.

Whenever a liberal begins a statement with 'I don't know which is more frightening,' you know the answer is going to be pretty clear.

Spreading the news is your duty as a Christian, and there are many ways to do this.

To kill a human being is, after all, the least injury you can do him.

I didn't choose Russia but Russia chose me. I had been fascinated from an early age by the culture, the language, the literature and the history to the place.

The legislator learns that when you talk a lot, you get in trouble. You have to listen a lot to make deals.

Certain political figures think when you call them and ask them for a comment; that you are somehow doing something that you shouldn't be doing.

The only success worth one's powder was success in the line of one's idiosyncrasy... what was talent but the art of being completely whatever one happened to be?

I suspect there have been a number of conspiracies that never were described or leaked out. But I suspect none of the magnitude and sweep of Watergate.

I'm interested in themes that endure from generation to generation.

Some newspapers have a hands-off policy on favored politicians. But it's generally very small newspapers or local TV stations.

Sexuality is the lyricism of the masses.

Neither Western donor countries like the U.S. nor poor recipients like Cameroon care much about Africans who are poor, rural and female

Because of Watergate in part, I am kind of a magnet for calls and information and suggestions.

Suppose Watergate had not been uncovered? I'd still be on the City Desk.

There's hostility to lying, and there should be.

I give lectures for money, but all the money goes to charity. So, I make no money from it.

By focusing once and for all on helping the Palestinians build a free society, I have no doubt that an historic compromise between Israelis and Palestinians can be reached and that peace can prevail.

I became paralyzed as an artist with writer's block.

I often heard about his cases and I often sat in on his trials. In the late 1960s when I was growing up I wanted to be a crusader like him but I didn't want to wear a suit and commute.

I try to be careful about wording. One of the things I've tried to combat in my blog is the notion that journalists are arrogant and unconcerned with the readership.

I had - all my life, everybody who knew me thought that I would probably grow up to be a reporter, a newspaper reporter because we didn't have much television in those days.

I used to be a print reporter.

The bulk of the emails tend to come after a column. I can get about 2,000 after a column.

But if you don't enjoy doing something, you'll be miserable no matter how much money you make.

My favorite thing is still journalism. I'm almost 50. This has been my life ever since I was in college.

Even more important maybe, or equally more important at least, is they don't have to scrap for a living.

There is nothing more imprudent than excessive prudence.