At fourteen you don't need sickness or death for tragedy. — Jessamyn West Adolescence Copy Share Image
We can love an honest rogue, but what is more offensive than a false saint? — Jessamyn West Honest Copy Share Image
A broken bone can heal, but the wound a word opens can fester forever. — Jessamyn West Broken Copy Share Image
Faithfulness to the past can be a kind of death above ground. Writing of the past is a resurrection; the past then… — Jessamyn West Death Copy Share Image
Only a fool would refuse to enter a fool's paradise when that's the only paradise he'll ever have a chance to enter. — Jessamyn West Chance Copy Share Image
It is not easy to be solitary unless you are also born ruthless. Every solitary repudiates someone. — Jessamyn West Born Copy Share Image
The emotion, the ecstasy of love, we all want, but God spare us the responsibility. — Jessamyn West Ecstasy Copy Share Image
Writing is so difficult that I feel that writers, having had their hell on earth, will escape all punishment hereafter. — Jessamyn West Difficult Copy Share Image
A taste for irony has kept more hearts from breaking than a sense of humor, for it takes irony to appreciate the… — Jessamyn West Humor Copy Share Image
If you train people properly, they won't be able to tell a drill from the real thing. If anything, the real thing… — Jessamyn West Able Copy Share Image
You make what seems a simple choice: choose a man or a job or a neighborhood- and what you have chosen is… — Jessamyn West Choice Copy Share Image
Being consistent meant not departing from convictions already formulated; being a leader meant making other persons accept these convictions. It was a… — Jessamyn West Accepting Copy Share Image
There are two barriers that often prevent communication between the young and their elders. The first is middle-aged forgetfulness of the fact… — Jessamyn West Aging Copy Share Image
There is no royal path to good writing; and such paths as exist do not lead through neat critical gardens, various as… — Jessamyn West Crafts Copy Share Image
I seem to be the only person in the world who doesn't mind being pitied. If you love me, pity me. The… — Jessamyn West Born Copy Share Image
In their sympathies, children feel nearer animals than adults. They frolic with animals, caress them, share with them feelings neither has words… — Jessamyn West Adults Copy Share Image
The conversation of two people remembering, if the memory is enjoyable to both, rocks on like music or lovemaking. There is a… — Jessamyn West Anticipate Copy Share Image
“Writing is a solitary occupation. Family, friends, and society are natural enemies of the writer. He must be alone, uninterrupted and slightly… — Jessamyn West Community Copy Share Image
Knowledge of what you love somehow comes to you; you don’t have to read nor analyze nor study. If you love a… — Jessamyn West Enough Copy Share Image
One can write out of love or hate. Hate tells one a great deal about a person. Love makes one become the… — Jessamyn West Blind Copy Share Image
In their sympathies, children feel nearer animals than adults. — Jessamyn West Animals Copy Share Image
The source of one's joy is also often the source of one's sorrow. — Jessamyn West Also Copy Share Image
“Talent is helpful in writing, but guts are absolutely essential.” — Jessamyn West Guts Copy Share Image
The past is really almost as much a work of the imagination as the future. — Jessamyn West Future Copy Share Image
Talent is helpful in writing, but guts are absolutely necessary. — Jessamyn West Guts Copy Share Image
“Some people are always thirsting for water from other people's wells.” — Jessamyn West People Copy Share Image
Each death and departure comes to us as a surprise, a sorrow never anticipated. Life is a long series of farewells; only… — Jessamyn West Circumstances Copy Share Image
