People want to know why the South is so interested in the Civil War. I had maybe, it's a rough guess, about fifty fistfights in my life. Out of those fifty fistfights, the ones that I had the most vivid… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
The point I would make is that the novelist and the historian are seeking the same thing: the truth – not a different truth: the same truth – only they reach it, or try to reach it, by different routes.… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
Of all the passions of mankind, the love of novelty most rules the mind. In search of this, from realm to realm we roam.… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
“For my part I consider the central idea pervading this struggle is the necessity that is upon us of proving that popular government is… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
I think making mistakes and discovering them for yourself is of great value, but to have someone else to point out your mistakes is… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
I began the way nearly everybody I ever heard of - I began writing poetry. And I find that to be quite usual with… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
“He is the kind of person I should expect to rescue one from a mad dog at any risk but then insist on a… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
And I'm a slow writer: five, six hundred words is a good day. That's the reason it took me 20 years to write those… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
If you want to study writing, read Dickens. That's how to study writing, or Faulkner, or D.H. Lawrence, or John Keats. They can teach… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
I ran into Ku Klux Klan and the threat of hurricanes, and those two things made me decide not to build on the Alabama… — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
I took five years on the first volume, five years on the second volume, and ten years on the third volume. — Shelby Foote Copy Share Image
