Humans generally get out the gist of what they need to say right at the beginning, then spend forever qualifying, contradicting, burnishing… — Richard Ford Copy Share Image
I’m busy sorting through our new collection of rhinestone jewelry. Should anyone be in the market for sparkly accessories the size of… — Jen Lancaster Copy Share Image
For the first time his mind grasped the fact that when life has sentenced you to suffer, the sentence is neither a… — Jens Peter Jacobsen Copy Share Image
I don't find myself interesting as a person and the details I find boring, quite frankly. You could sum it up in… — Peter Ackroyd Copy Share Image
There are betrayals in war that are childlike compared with our human betrayals during peace. The new lovers enter the habits of… — Michael Ondaatje Copy Share Image
I still have a hard time saying who Johnny [ Cash ] is in one sentence. He seemed so contradictory in his… — Joaquin Phoenix Copy Share Image
It is altogether unlawful to kill oneself... Wherefore suicide is contrary to the inclination of nature, and to charity whereby every man… — Thomas Aquinas Copy Share Image
What I do instead is I will cheerfully spend literally hours on identifier names: variable names, method names, and so forth, to… — Joshua Bloch Copy Share Image
Listen and learn: you need fourteen characters, minimum. Use random letters, not words. Here’s a tip: think of a sentence, and use… — Julie James Copy Share Image
For many years I wanted to be a rock star but of course that didn't work out. I did however write on… — Tommy Wiseau Copy Share Image
If I let my fingers wander idly over the keys of a typewriter it might happen that my screed made an intelligible… — Arthur Eddington Copy Share Image
A dependent clause (a sentence fragment set off by commas, dontcha know) helps you explore your story by moving you deeper into… — Janet Fitch Copy Share Image
Alethea Black can drop you into a dream with a single sentence, then convince you it's real. Her characters' best hopes and… — Ralph Lombreglia Copy Share Image
Long before the idea of a writer's conference was a glimmer in anyone's eye, writers learned by reading the work of their… — Francine Prose Copy Share Image
I always thought old age would be a writer’s best chance. Whenever I read the late work of Goethe or W. B.… — Samuel Beckett Copy Share Image
No its you," she said. How far away her voice sounded, as though it had traveled to London already, ahead of her.… — Loretta Chase Copy Share Image
Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil. That sentence is the leper's bell of an… — Ayn Rand Copy Share Image
When you speak a foreign language, you become someone else. If you aren't used to speaking a language, and you start speaking… — Eugene Green Copy Share Image
It can be a simple sentence that makes one single point and you build for that. You zero in on one moment… — Jack Lemmon Copy Share Image
When I was kid, they always used to tell me to keep notebooks. I look at my shelves now and it's just… — John Darnielle Copy Share Image
He who sees his heir in his own child, carries his eye over hopes and possessions lying far beyond his gravestone, viewing… — Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton Copy Share Image
I suspected learning a language would be both useful and enjoyable (I love memorising lists of things), and would get rid of… — Deborah Smith Copy Share Image
I am grateful to Stacy Schiff first of all because she can write a sentence-because she offers us her scholarship with wit,… — Tracy Kidder Copy Share Image
My name is indigenous to my country, it is not easy to pronounce, it takes effort to say correctly and I am… — Warsan Shire Copy Share Image
I find I can write for two lines, and then I have nothing else to say. For me, the only way to… — Aimee Bender Copy Share Image
A knife!" I yelled, still brandishing my pillow. "Jim, I command you to get me a gelding knife. If this guy wants… — Katie MacAlister Copy Share Image
I'm not through with you yet. Are you prepared to accept your punishment?" I nodded reluctantly. I wasn't sure what a vampire's… — Ellen Schreiber Copy Share Image
The most important sentence in any article is the first one. If it doesn't induce the reader to proceed to the second… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
There is never finality in the display terminal's screen, but an irresponsible whimsicality, as words, sentences, and paragraphs are negated at the… — Alexander Cockburn Copy Share Image
When I start, I have a feeling for the characters, and maybe the shape of the story. Sometimes I might even have… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I had this bad habit of not writing out a first draft and going back. For me it was the first sentence,… — Donald Ray Pollock Copy Share Image
Just as the sentence contains one idea in all its fullness, so the paragraph should embrace a distinct episode; and as sentences… — Winston Churchill Copy Share Image
That doesn't make any sense. Sorry. There's no known way of saying an English sentence in which you begin a sentence with… — Orson Welles Copy Share Image
When you translate poetry in particular, you're obliged to look at how the writer with whom you're working puts together words, sentences,… — Marilyn Hacker Copy Share Image
To slay the sinner is then the first use of the Law, to destroy the life and strength wherein he trusts and… — John Wesley Copy Share Image
“After resting in the cool, shadowy interior for a while, with feelings of both gratitude and distaste, he set off once more,… — W.G. Sebald Copy Share Image
The first book ever written in an alphabet was the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament. And the most important passage was… — Leonard Shlain Copy Share Image
Punctuation is the art of dividing a written composition into sentences, or parts of sentences, by points or stops, for the purpose… — Lindley Murray Copy Share Image
If you leave me naked and waiting on the bed without making love to me, I’ll—” I didn’t get to finish the… — Patricia Briggs Copy Share Image
I am not a particularly natural writer. I am not a person who can write in paragraphs the way some writers do.… — Yann Martel Copy Share Image