Quote collection
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"I read the Bible to myself; I'll take any translation, any edition, and read it aloud, just to hear the language, hear the rhythm, and remind myself how beautiful English is."
"It's still scary every time I go back to the past. Each morning, my heart catches. When I get there, I remember how the light was, where the draft was coming from, what odors were in the air. When I write, I get all the weeping out."
"I agree with Balzac and 19th-century writers, black and white, who say, 'I write for money.' Yes, I think everybody should be paid handsomely; I insist on it, and I pay people who work for me, or with me, handsomely."
"My grandmother told me that every good thing I do helps some human being in the world. I believed her 50 years ago and still do."
"I think Clinton, after getting into office and into Washington, was shocked at being bludgeoned. So he spent time trying to be all things to all people - one way guaranteed not to be successful or respected in a lion's den. You can't just play around with all those big cats - you've got to take somebody on."
"You can only accomplish what I really love. Do not take the money as a goal. Instead, pursue the things you passionate about, and do good to others can not take my eyes off you"
"Putting down on paper what you have to say is an important part of writing, but the words and ideas have to be shaped and cleaned, cleaned as severely as a dog cleans a bone, cleaned until there's not a shred of anything superfluous."
"At one time, you could sit on the Rue de la Paix in Paris or at the Habima Theater in Tel Aviv or in Medina and you could see a person come in, black, white, it didn't matter. You said, 'That's an American' because there's a readiness to smile and to talk to people."
"And one of my absolute favorite quotes of all-time, one that I've adopted as one of my greatest life mottos: Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told: "I'm with you kid. Let's go.""
"The woman who truly intends to live a good life is already living phenomenally since intent is part of the achievement."
"Never, never let a person know you're frightened. And a group of them ... absolutely never. Fear brings out the worst in everybody."
"I'm a spring leaf trembling in anticipation."
"Each time a dancer moves devoutly or a composer faithfully searches the silence for the veiled melodies, eternity is engaged."
"Nothing succeeds like success. Get a little success, and then just get a little more."
"Courage - you develop courage by doing small things like just as if you wouldn't want to pick up a 100-pound weight without preparing yourself."
"I'm convinced that I'm a child of God. That's wonderful, exhilarating, liberating, full of promise. But the burden which goes along with that is, I'm convinced that everybody is a child of God. . . . I weep a lot. I thank God I laugh a lot, too. The main thing in one's own private world is to try to laugh as much as you cry."
"I'm working at trying to be a Christian and that's serious business. It's like trying to be a good Jew, a good Muslim, a good Buddhist, a good Shintoist, a good Zoroastrian, a good friend, a good lover, a good mother, a good buddyit's serious business. It's not something where you think, Oh, I've got it done. I did it all day, hotdiggety. The truth is, all day long you try to do it, try to be it, and then in the evening if you're honest and have a little courage you look at yourself and say, Hmm. I only blew it eighty-six times. Not bad."
"You may not remember what a person said to you, you may not remember what a person did to you, but you will never forget how a person made you feel!"
"It's so tedious writing cookbooks or writing the recipes because I've never been much of a measurer. But to write a book, you have to measure everything."
"At our best, we're all teachers"