Authors On Authors Quotes

Storytelling is a gift, but writing is a learned art. ~ Beem Weeks

Somebody told me I'm a writer. I believed them. Now I regret it. ~ Stefanos Livos

Choosing a color for your paperback book cover feels like entering a mall and seeing a dress you love, just your size, and available in a number of colors – each of which is lovely in its own manner – so you want them all! ...But you must choose only one... Isn't this one of the hardest choices to make? :-) ~ Sahara Sanders

The books we read in childhood don't exist anymore; they sailed off with the wind, leaving bare skeletons behind. Whoever still has in him the memory and marrow of childhood should rewrite these books as he experienced them. ~ Bruno Schulz

This is a forum for readers. Authors walk these halls at their own risk. I've been to the Coliseum in Rome. GR is just that. Books are gladiators. Readers are ravenous citizens awaiting their next bite of entertainment, all Caesars with thumbs readied for judgement. Even champions fall prey to sword now and then. And you know what they say about the pen and the sword…the analogy is a bit muddled, but it's in there somewhere. ~ Willow Madison

Herman Melville came to see me at the Consulate, looking much as he used to do (a little paler, and perhaps a little sadder), in a rough outside coat, and with his characteristic gravity and reserve of manner.... [W]e soon found ourselves on pretty much our former terms of sociability and confidence. Melville has not been well, of late; ... and no doubt has suffered from too constant literary occupation, pursued without much success, latterly; and his writings, for a long while past, have indicated a morbid state of mind.... Melville, as he always does, began to reason of Providence and futurity, and of everything that lies beyond human ken, and informed me that he had "pretty much made up his mind to be annihilated"; but still he does not seem to rest in that anticipation; and, I think, will never rest until he gets hold of a definite belief. It is strange how he persists -- and has persisted ever since I knew him, and probably long before -- in wondering to-and-fro over these deserts, as dismal and monotonous as the sand hills amid which we were sitting. He can neither believe, nor be comfortable in his unbelief; and he is too honest and courageous not to try to do one or the other. If he were a religious man, he would be one of the most truly religious and reverential; he has a very high and noble nature, and better worth immortality than most of us.

[after what would be their last meeting] ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne

(On Charles Dickens) It has been the peculiarity and the marvel of this man's power, that he has invested his puppets with a charm that has enabled him to dispense with human nature. ~ Anthony Trollope

The novelist is condemned to wander all his life. Homeless and blind like Oedipus he wanders until death. And so let us protect the novelist and adore him, with pity, honor, and love. ~ Roman Payne