Thinking Quotes by Erica Jong

Once I worshipped Keats for dying young. Now I think it's braver to die old.

— Erica Jong

Art keeps one young, I think, because it keeps one perpetually a beginner, perpetually a child.

— Erica Jong

I don't think that sex necessarily produces intimacy.

— Erica Jong

Perhaps every generation thinks of itself as a lost generation and perhaps every generation is right.

— Erica Jong

I think the Jews are an amazing group of people and their survival is amazing.

— Erica Jong

Every time I catch myself saying, "Oh no, you shouldn't try that," I think, "Yes, I should."

— Erica Jong

They keep saying the right person will come along. I think mine got hit by a truck.

— Erica Jong

It is for this, partly, that I write. How can I know what I think unless I see what I write.

— Erica Jong

Women's books are kind of discriminated against. If a man writes a book about his family stories, people think of it as…

— Erica Jong

Loving someone is a loss of freedom -- but one doesn't think of it as loss because one gains so much else.

— Erica Jong

I think I've become more cynical about sex. Meaning, I don't think sex in and of itself leads to an epiphany.

— Erica Jong

I'm interested in what happens to people when they get into that publicity machine. We tend to think things have changed, but…

— Erica Jong

I think feminism means what it has always meant - women want to use all their gifts, all their talents and be…

— Erica Jong

I don't think that I had any idea that 'Fear of Flying' would become a part of the culture. I had no…

— Erica Jong

I thought to spend my declining years writing poetry and teaching - but that won't pay the Bergdorf's bill. I think I'll…

— Erica Jong

I think men have always been afraid of women's sexuality, and the restrictions they put on women testify to that.

— Erica Jong

Women in America read 'lifestyle' pages which are really glorifications of shopping. They teach us we must veil ourselves in make-up to…

— Erica Jong

I was always a feminist. My mother was a feminist; my grandmother was a feminist. I always understood women had to fight…

— Erica Jong

A baby's a full time job for three adults. Nobody tells you that when you're pregnant, or you'd probably jump off a…

— Erica Jong

I am against censorship. I prefer the chaos of uncontrollable communication of all sorts to selective banning of certain materials. I do…

— Erica Jong

I hope we don't have to keep going back over the same territory and winning the same rights over and over again.…

— Erica Jong

I think a lot of people, when they read about a woman who acknowledges her sexuality and her feelings, get really scared.…

— Erica Jong

Writing is one of the few professions left where you take all the responsibility for what you do. It's really dangerous and…

— Erica Jong

As a past president of the Writers Guild, I think women shouldn't write for free. Maybe you have to do it for…

— Erica Jong

There is this tendency to think that if you could only find the magic way, then you could become a poet. "Tell…

— Erica Jong

It's useful to know how much society's holding you back. My mother would talk about how she was told by the head…

— Erica Jong

Poetry is the language we speak in the most terrifying or ecstatic passages of our lives. But the very word poetry scares…

— Erica Jong

I stand in the mist and cry, thinking of myself standing in the mist and crying, and wondering if I will ever…

— Erica Jong

I actually think leaving your children alone to fantasize, to write, to make projects on their own is good for them. Breathing…

— Erica Jong

People always think that history proceeds in a straight line. It doesn't. Social attitudes don't change in a straight line. There's always…

— Erica Jong

Is there no Villain in this World who doth not regard himself as a poor abus'd Innocent, no She-Wolf who doth not…

— Erica Jong

Most sex doesn't really bring people together. You have to reach a certain level of connection, I think, and that's pretty rare.

— Erica Jong

Often I find that poems predict what I'm going to do later in my own writing, and often I find that poems…

— Erica Jong

Sex is God's joke on the human race ... if we didn't have sex to make us ridiculous, She would have had…

— Erica Jong

I mostly hate organized religion, which I think is a force for the oppression of women and creates warfare.

— Erica Jong

When I sit down at my writing desk, time seems to vanish. I think it's a wonderful way to spend one's life.

— Erica Jong

I think poetry is the best thing I do. It's certainly the purest. I seem to switch gears without too much trouble.…

— Erica Jong

I don't think you will ever fully understand how you've touched my life and made me who I am. I don't think…

— Erica Jong

The greatest feminists have also been the greatest lovers. I'm thinking not only of Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley, but…

— Erica Jong

I think that the joy of writing a novel is the self-exploratio n that emerges and also that wonderful feeling of playing…

— Erica Jong