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No One Can Write A Best Seller By Trying To. He Must Write With Complete Sincerity; The Clichés That Make You Laugh, The Hackneyed Characters, The Well-worn Situations, The Commonplace Story That Excites Your Derision, Seem Neither Hackneyed, Well Worn Nor Commonplace To Him. ... The Conclusion Is Obvious: You Cannot Write Anything That Will Convince Unless You Are Yourself Convinced. The Best Seller Sells Because He Writes With His Heart's Blood.

-W. Somerset Maugham

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No One Can Write

W. Somerset Maugham

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No One Can Write A Best Seller By Trying To. He Must Write With Complete Sincerity; The Clichés That Make You Laugh, The Hackneyed Characters, The Well-worn Situations, The Commonplace Story That Excites Your Derision, Seem Neither Hackneyed, Well Worn Nor Commonplace To Him. ... The Conclusion Is Obvious: You Cannot Write Anything That Will Convince Unless You Are Yourself Convinced. The Best Seller Sells Because He Writes With His Heart's Blood.

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What Has Influenced My Life More Than Any Other Single Thing Has Been My Stammer. Had I Not Stammered I Would Probably... Have Gone To Cambridge As My Brothers Did, Perhaps Have Become A Don And Every Now And Then Published A Dreary Book About French Literature.

Her Tears Were Partly Tears Of Happiness, For She Felt That The Strangeness Between Them Was Gone. She Loved Him Now With A New Love Because He Had Made Her Suffer.

So Long As Some Are Strong And Some Are Weak, The Weak Will Be Driven To The Wall.

A Man Who Is A Politician At Forty Is A Statesman At Three Score And Ten. It Is At This Age, When He Would Be Too Old To Be A Clerk Or A Gardener Or A Police-court Magistrate, That He Is Ripe To Govern A Country.

She Plunged Into A Sea Of Platitudes, And With The Powerful Breast Stroke Of A Channel Swimmer Made Her Confident Way Towards The White Cliffs Of The Obvious.

Life Is So Largely Controlled By Chance That Its Conduct Can Be But A Perpetual Improvisation.

Well, You Know When People Are No Good At Anything Else They Become Writers.

The Moral I Draw Is That The Writer Should Seek His Reward In The Pleasure Of His Work And In Release From The Burden Of Thought; And, Indifferent To Aught Else, Care Nothing For Praise Or Censure, Failure Or Success.

From Old Habit, Unconsciously He Thanked God That He No Longer Believed In Him.

There Is No Need For The Writer To Eat A Whole Sheep To Be Able To Tell You What Mutton Tastes Like. It Is Enough If He Eats A Cutlet. But He Should Do That.

I Can Imagine No More Comfortable Frame Of Mind For The Conduct Of Life Than A Humorous Resignation.

It Was Like Making A Blunder At A Party; There Was Nothing To Do About It, It Was Dreadfully Mortifying, But It Showed A Lack Of Sense To Ascribe Too Much Importance To It.

I Know That I Shall Die Struggling For Breath, And I Know That I Shall Be Horribly Afraid. I Know That I Shall Not Be Able To Keep Myself From Regretting Bitterly The Life That Has Brought Me To Such A Pass; But I Disown That Regret. I Now, Weak, Old, Diseased, Poor, Dying, Hold Still My Soul In My Hands, And I Regret Nothing.

Imagination Grows By Exercise, And Contrary To Common Belief, Is More Powerful In The Mature Than In The Young.

A State Of Reverie Does Not Avoid Reality, It Accedes To Reality.

I Don't Think Of The Past. The Only Thing That Matters Is The Everlasting Present.

The Artist Produces For The Liberation Of His Soul. It Is His Nature To Create As It Is The Nature Of Water To Run Down The Hill.

As If A Woman Ever Loved A Man For His Virtue.

I've Always Been Interested In People, But I've Never Liked Them.

There Are Three Rules For Writing A Novel. Unfortunately, No One Knows What They Are.

There Is Nothing So Degrading As The Constant Anxiety About One's Means Of Livelihood.

The Only Important Thing In A Book Is The Meaning That It Has For You.

I'm Only Twenty-five. If I've Made A Mistake I Have Time To Correct It.

I Would Sooner Read A Time-table Or A Catalogue Than Nothing At All. They Are Much More Entertaining Than Half The Novels That Are Written.

Through The History Of The World There Have Always Been Exploiters And Exploited. There Always Will Be ... Because The Great Mass Of Men Are Made By Nature To Be Slaves, They Are Unfit To Control Themselves, And For Their Own Good Need Masters.

...i Couldn't But Surmise That The Devil, Looking At The Cruel Wars That Christianity Has Occasioned, The Persecutions, The Tortures Christian Has Inflicted On Christian, The Unkindness, The Hypocracy, The Intolerance, Must Consider The Balance Sheet With Complacency. And When He Remembers That It Has Laid Upon Mankind The Bitter Burden Of The Sense Of Sin That Has Darkened The Beauty Of The Starry Night And Cast A Baleful Shadow On The Passing Plesures Of A World To Be Enjoyed, He Must Chuckle As He Murmurs: Give The Devil His Due.

There's Always One Who Loves And One Who Lets Himself Be Loved.

I Never Met An Author Who Admitted That People Did Not Buy His Book Because It Was Dull.

No Affectation Of Peculiarity Can Conceal A Commonplace Mind.

Hypocrisy Is The Most Difficult And Nerve-racking Vice That Any Man Can Pursue; It Needs An Unceasing Vigilance And A Rare Detachment Of Spirit. It Cannot, Like Adultery Or Gluttony, Be Practiced At Spare Moments; It Is A Whole-time Job.

Dying Is The Most Hellishly Boresome Experience In The World! Particularly When It Entails Dying Of 'natural Causes'.

The Spirit Is Often Most Free When The Body Is Satiated With Pleasure; Indeed, Sometimes The Stars Shine More Brightly Seen From The Gutter Than From The Hilltop.

For Men And Women Are Not Only Themselves; They Are Also The Region In Which They Are Born, The City Apartment Or Farm In Which They Learnt To Walk, The Games They Played As Children, The Old Wives Tales They Overheard, The Food They Ate, The Schools They Attended, The Sports They Followed, The Poets They Read, And The God They Believed In. It Is All These Things That Have Made Them What They Are, And These Are The Things That You Can't Come To Know By Hearsay.

There Are Men Who Are Possessed By An Urge So Strong To Do Some Particular Thing That They Can't Help Themselves, They've Got To Do It. They're Prepared To Sacrifice Everything To Satisfy Their Yearning.

Love Is Only A Dirty Trick Played On Us To Achieve Continuation Of The Species.

Some Of Us Look For The Way In Opium And Some In God, Some Of Us In Whiskey And Some In Love. It Is All The Same Way And It Leads Nowhither.

For Men, As A Rule, Love Is But An Episode Which Takes Place Among The Other Affairs Of The Day, And The Emphasis Laid On It In Novels Gives It An Importance Which Is Untrue To Life. There Are Few Men To Whom It Is The Most Important Thing In The World, And They Are Not The Very Interesting Ones; Even Women, With Whom The Subject Is Of Paramount Interest, Have A Contempt For Them.

Beauty Is Also A Gift Of God, One Of The Most Rare And Precious, And We Should Be Thankful If We Are Happy Enough To Possess It And Thankful, If We Are Not, That Others Possess It For Our Pleasure.

The Trouble With Young Writers Is That They Are All In Their Sixties.

The Day Broke Grey And Dull. The Clouds Hung Heavily, And There Was A Rawness In The Air That Suggested Snow. A Woman Servant Came Into A Room In Which A Child Was Sleeping And Drew The Curtains. She Glanced Mechanically At The House Opposite, A Stucco House With A Portico, And Went To The Child's Bed.

Everyone Had Some Defect, Or Body Or Of Mind: He Thought Of All The People He Had Known (the Whole World Was Like A Sick House And There Was No Rhyme Or Reason In It), He Saw A Long Procession, Deformed In Body, Warped In Mind, Some With Illness Of The Flesh, Weak Hearts Or Weak Lungs, And Some With Illness Of The Spirit, Languor Of Will, Or Craving For Liquor. At That Moment He Felt A Holy Compassion For Them All. …the Words Of The Dying God Crossed His Memory: Forgive Them, For They Know Not What They Do.

The Mathematician Who After Seeing Phedre Asked: 'qu'est Que Ca Prouve?' Was Not Such A Fool As He Has Been Generally Made Out. No One Has Ever Been Able To Explain Why The Doric Temple Of Paestum Is More Beautiful Than A Glass Of Cold Beer Except By Bringing In Considerations That Have Nothing To Do With Beauty.

You Must Not Pursue A Success, But Fly From It.

The Audience Is Not The Least Important Actor In The Play And If It Will Not Do Its Allotted Share The Play Falls To Pieces.

To Bear Failure With Courage Is The Best Proof Of Character That Anyone Can Give.

When A Woman Loves You She's Not Satisfied Until She Possesses Your Soul. Because She's Weak, She Has A Rage For Domination, And Nothing Less Will Satisfy Her.

When You're Eighteen Your Emotions Are Violent, But They're Not Durable.

Kant Thought Things, Not Because They Were True, But Because He Was Kant.

I Forget Who It Was That Recommended Men For Their Soul's Good To Do Each Day Two Things They Disliked: It Was A Wise Man, And It Is A Precept That I Have Followed Scrupulously; For Every Day I Have Got Up And I Have Gone To Bed.

Yet Magic Is No More Than The Art Of Employing Consciously Invisible Means To Produce Visible Effects. Will, Love And Imagination Are Magic Powers That Everyone Possesses; And Whoever Knows How To Develop Them To Their Fullest Extent Is A Magician. Magic Has But One Dogma, Namely, That The Seen Is The Measure Of The Unseen.

You Know, Of Course, That The Tasmanians, Who Never Committed Adultery, Are Now Extinct.

Cronshaw Stopped For A Moment To Drink. He Had Pondered For Twenty Years The Problem Whether He Loved Liquor Because It Made Him Talk Or Whether He Loved Conversation Because It Made Him Thirsty.

The Essence Of The Beautiful Is Unity In Variety.

Death Is A Very Dull, Dreary Affair, And My Advice To You Is To Have Nothing Whatsoever To Do With It.

If A Nation Values Anything More Than Freedom, It Will Lose Its Freedom; And The Irony Of It Is That If It Is Comfort Or Money That It Values More, It Will Lose That Too.

Libertarian Party

The Author Always Loads His Dice, But He Must Never Let The Reader See That He Has Done So, And By The Manipulation Of His Plot, He Can Engage The Reader's Attention So That He Does Not Perceive The Violence That Has Been Done To Him.

The Writer Of Prose Can Only Step Aside When The Poet Passes...

Tolerance Is Only Another Name For Indifference.

The Passing Moment Is All We Can Be Sure Of; It Is Only Common Sense To Extract Its Utmost Value From It.

Passing Moments

Has It Occurred To You That Transmigration Is At Once An Explanation And A Justification Of The Evil Of The World? If The Evils We Suffer Are The Result Of Sins Committed In Our Past Lives, We Can Bear Them With Resignation And Hope That If In This One We Strive Toward Virtue Out Future Lives Will Be Less Afflicted.

From The Earliest Time The Old Have Rubbed It Into The Young That They Are Wiser, And Before The Young Had Discovered What Nonsense This Was They Were Old Too, And It Profited Them To Carry On The Imposture.

A Writer Need Not Devour A Whole Sheep In Order To Know What Mutton Tastes Like, But He Must At Least Eat A Chop. Unless He Gets His Facts Right, His Imagination Will Lead Him Into All Kinds Of Nonsense, And The Facts He Is Most Likely To Get Right Are The Facts Of His Own Experience.

If You'd Ever Had A Grown-up Daughter You'd Know That By Comparison A Bucking Steer Is Easy To Manage. And As To Knowing What Goes On Inside Her - Well, It's Much Better To Pretend You're The Simple, Innocent Old Fool She Almost Certainly Takes You For.

No Author Can Create A Character Out Of Nothing. He Must Have A Model To Give Him A Starting Point; But Then His Imagination Goes To Work, He Builds Him Up, Adding A Trait Here, A Trait There, Which His Model Did Not Possess.

The Drama Is Make-believe. It Does Not Deal With Truth But With Effect.

The Humour Of Dostoievsky Is The Humour Of A Barloafer Who Ties A Kettle To A Dog's Tail.

I Did Not Believe Him Capable Of Love. That Is An Emotion In Which Tenderness Is An Essential Part, But Strickland Had No Tenderness Either For Himself Or For Others; There Is In Love A Sense Of Weakness, A Desire To Protect, An Eagerness To Do Good And To Give Pleasure--if Not Unselfishness, At All Events A Selfishness Which Marvellously Conceals Itself; It Has In It A Certain Diffidence.

Genius Is Talent Provided With Ideals. Genius Starves While Talent Wears Purple And Fine Linen. The Man Of Genius Of Today Will Infifty Years' Time Be In Most Cases No More Than A Man Of Talent.

Was It Necessary To Tell Me That You Wanted Nothing In The World But Me?' The Corners Of His Mouth Drooped Peevishly. Oh, My Dear, It's Rather Hard To Take Quite Literally The Things A Man Says When He's In Love With You.' Didn't You Mean Them?' At The Moment.

It Is Astonishing How Many Books I Find There Is No Need For Me To Read At All.

The Most Useful Thing About A Principle Is That It Can Always Be Sacrificed To Expediency.

There Is Only One Way To Win Hearts And That Is To Make Oneself Like Unto Those Of Whom One Would Be Loved.

There Is Nothing So Terrible As The Pursuit Of Art By Those Who Have No Talent.

Art Should Be Appreciated With Passion And Violence, Not With A Tepid, Depreciating Elegance That Fears The Censoriousness Of A Common Room.

A Man Ought To Work. That's What He's Here For. That's How He Contributes To The Welfare Of The Community.

She Had A Pretty Gift For Quotation, Which Is A Serviceable Substitute For Wit.

It Requires The Feminine Temperament To Repeat The Same Thing Three Times With Unabated Zest.

Success. I Don't Believe It Has Any Effect On Me. For One Thing I Always Expected It.

If You Want To Eat Well In England, Eat Three Breakfasts.

Writing Is A Wholetime Job: No Professional Writer Can Afford Only To Write When He Feels Like It.

It Has Been Said That Metaphysics Is The Finding Of Bad Reasons For What We Believe Upon Instinct.

Few Misfortunes Can Befall A Boy Which Bring Worse Consequence Than To Have A Really Affectionate Mother.

No One Can Write A Best Seller By Trying To. He Must Write With Complete Sincerity; The Clichés That Make You Laugh, The Hackneyed Characters, The Well-worn Situations, The Commonplace Story That Excites Your Derision, Seem Neither Hackneyed, Well Worn Nor Commonplace To Him. ... The Conclusion Is Obvious: You Cannot Write Anything That Will Convince Unless You Are Yourself Convinced. The Best Seller Sells Because He Writes With His Heart's Blood.

There's No One As Transparent As The Person Who Thinks He's Devilish Deep.

Refecting On The High Divorce Rate In America As Contrasted With England "american Women Expect To Find In Their Husbands A Perfection That English Women Only Hope To Find In Their Butlers

One Does Not Really Feel Much Grief At Other People's Sorrows; One Tries, And Puts On A Melancholy Face, Thinking Oneself Brutal For Not Caring More; But One Cannot And It Is Better, For If One Grieved Too Deeply At Other People's Tears, Life Would Be Unendurable; And Every Man Has Sufficient Sorrows Of His Own Without Taking To Heart His Neighbour's.

A Bird In The Hand Was Worth Two In The Bush, He Told Her, To Which She Retorted That A Proverb Was The Last Refuge Of The Mentally Destitute.

The Novel May Stimulate You To Think. It May Satisfy Your Aesthetic Sense. It May Arouse Your Moral Emotions. But If It Does Not Entertain You It Is A Bad Novel.

If Nobody Spoke Unless He Had Something To Say, The Human Race Would Very Soon Lose The Use Of Speech.

There Is No Explanation For Evil. It Must Be Looked Upon As A Necessary Part Of The Order Of The Universe. To Ignore It Is Childish, To Bewail It Senseless.

The Arguments For Immortality, Weak When You Take Them One By One, Are No More Cogent When You Take Them Together... For My Part, I Cannot See How Consciousness Can Persist When Its Physical Basis Has Been Destroyed, And I Am Too Sure Of The Interconnection Of My Body And My Mind To Think That Any Survival Of My My Consciousness Apart From My Body Would Be In Any Sense A Survival Of Myself.

I Am Told That Today Rather More Than 60 Per Cent Of The Men Who Go To The Universities Go On A Government Grant. This Is A New Class That Has Entered Upon The Scene ... They Are Scum.

Because A Man Can Write Great Works He Is None The Less A Man.

It Is Not True That Suffering Ennobles The Character; Happiness Does That Sometimes, But Suffering For The Most Part, Makes Men Petty And Vindictive.

Now The Answer ... Is Plain, But It Is So Unpalatable That Most Men Will Not Face It. There Is No Reason For Life And Life Has No Meaning.

Women Are Strange Little Beasts,' He Said To Dr. Coutras. 'you Can Treat Them Like Dogs, You Can Beat Them Till Your Arm Aches, And Still They Love You.' He Shrugged His Shoulders. 'of Course, It Is One Of The Most Absurd Illusions Of Christianity That They Have Souls.

All Important Persons Have About Them Someone In A Subordinate Position Who Has Their Ear. These Dependents Are Very Susceptible To Slights, And, When They Are Not Treated As They Think They Should Be, Will By Well-directed Shafts, Constantly Repeated, Poison The Minds Of Their Patrons Against Those Who Have Provoked Their Animosity. It Is Well To Keep In With Them.

A Mother Only Does Her Children Harm If She Makes Them The Only Concern Of Her Life.

The Great Tragedy Of Life Is Not That Men Perish, But That They Cease To Love.

I Have Always Been Convinced That If A Woman Once Made Up Her Mind To Marry A Man, Nothing But Instant Flight Could Save Him.

The Great Man Is Too Often All Of A Piece; It Is The Little Man That Is A Bundle Of Contradictory Elements. He Is Inexhaustible. You Never Come To The End Of The Surprises He Has In Store For You.

Like All Weak Men He Laid An Exaggerated Stress On Not Changing One's Mind.

She Could Not Admit But That He Had Remarkable Qualities, Sometimes She Thought That There Was Even In Him A Strange And Unattractive Greatness; It Was Curious Then That She Could Not Love Him, But Loved Still A Man Whose Worthlessness Was Now So Clear To Her.

Just As The Painter Thinks With His Brush And Paints The Novelist Thinks With His Story.

We Learn Resignation Not By Our Own Suffering, But By The Suffering Of Others.

Suffering Of Others

The Last Words He Said To Me When I Bade Him Good-night Were: Tell Amy It's No Good Coming After Me. Anyhow, I Shall Change My Hotel, So She Wouldn't Be Able To Find Me.' My Own Impression Is That She's Well Rid Of You,' I Said. My Dear Fellow, I Only Hope You'll Be Able To Make Her See It. But Women Are Very Unintelligent.

Art Is A Manifestation Of Emotion, And Emotion Speaks A Language That All May Understand.

The Love That Lasts Longest Is The Love That Is Never Returned.

Sometimes People Carry To Such Perfection The Mask They Have Assumed That In Due Course They Actually Become The Person They Seem.

There Was Once A Professor Of Law Who Said To His Students. When You Are Fighting A Case, If You Have Facts On Your Side Hammer Them Into The Jury, And If You Have The Law On Your Side Hammer It Into The Judge. But If You Have Neither The Facts Nor The Law, Asked One Of His Listeners? Then Hammer The Hell Into The Table, Answered The Professor.

Clearly Much That Seemed Valid Seemed So Only Because He Had Been Taught It From Earliest Youth.

It's A Funny Thing About Life; If You Refuse To Accept Anything But The Best, You Very Often Get It.

In The Country The Darkness Of Night Is Friendly And Familiar, But In A City, With Its Blaze Of Lights, It Is Unnatural, Hostile And Menacing. It Is Like A Monstrous Vulture That Hovers, Biding Its Time.

I Travel Because I Like To Move From Place To Place, I Enjoy The Sense Of Freedom It Gives Me, It Pleases Me To Be Rid Of Ties, Responsibilities, Duties, I Like The Unknown; I Meet Odd People Who Amuse Me For A Moment And Sometimes Suggest A Theme For A Composition; I Am Often Tired Of Myself And I Have A Notion That By Travel I Can Add To My Personality And So Change Myself A Little. I Do Not Bring Back From The Journey Quite The Same Self That I Took

She Says It's Really Not Very Flattering To Her That The Women Who Fall In Love With Her Husband Are So Uncommonly Second-rate.

Falling In Love

She Was A Fool And He Knew It And Because He Loved Her It Had Made No Difference.

The Future Will One Day Be The Present And Will Seem As Unimportant As The Present Does Now.

One Can Be Very Much In Love With A Woman Without Wishing To Spend The Rest Of One's Life With Her.

The Secret Of Play-writing Can Be Given In Two Maxims: Stick To The Point, And, Whenever You Can, Cut.

It Needs A Good Deal Of Philosophy Not To Be Mortified By The Thought Of Persons Who Have Voluntarily Abandoned Everything That For The Most Of Us Makes Life Worth Living And Are Devoid Of Envy Of What They Have Missed. I Have Never Made Up My Mind Whether They Are Fools Or Wise Men.

Simplicity And Naturalness Are The Truest Marks Of Distinction.

Oh, It's Always The Same,' She Sighed, 'if You Want Men To Behave Well To You, You Must Be Beastly To Them; If You Treat Them Decently They Make You Suffer For It.

Evil Can Be Condoned Only If In The Beyond It Is Compensated By Good And God Himself Needs Immortality To Vindicate His Ways To Man.

Women Are Constantly Trying To Commit Suicide For Love, But Generally They Take Care Not To Succeed.

Insensibly He Formed The Most Delightful Habit In The World, The Habit Of Reading: He Did Not Know That Thus He Was Providing Himself With A Refuge From All The Distress Of Life; He Did Not Know Either That He Was Creating For Himself An Unreal World Which Would Make The Real World Of Every Day A Source Of Bitter Disappointment.

It Is Not Difficult To Be Unconventional In The Eyes Of The World When Your Unconventionality Is But The Convention Of Your Set.

Thank God, I Can Look At A Sunset Now Without Having To Think How To Describe It

I Am Afraid Of People With Too Much Charm. They Devour You. In The End You Are Made A Sacrifice To The Exercise Of Their Fascinating Gift And Their Insincerity.

It Does The Heart Good To Look At You.

The Great Critic … Must Be A Philosopher, For From Philosophy He Will Learn Serenity, Impartiality, And The Transitoriness Of Human Things.

When She Liked Anyone It Was Quite Natural For Her To Go To Bed With Him. She Never Thought Twice About It. It Was Not Vice; It Wasn't Lasciviousness; It Was Her Nature. She Gave Herself As Naturally As The Sun Gives Heat Or The Flowers Their Perfume. It Was A Pleasure To Her And She Liked To Give Pleasure To Others.

I'll Give You My Opinion Of The Human Race In A Nutshell... Their Heart's In The Right Place, But Their Head Is A Thoroughly Inefficient Organ.

I Could Have Forgiven It If He'd Fallen Desperately In Love With Someone And Gone Off With Her. I Should Have Thought That Natural. I Shouldn't Really Have Blamed Him. I Should Have Thought He Was Led Away. Men Are So Weak, And Women Are So Unscrupulous.

Perhaps It Would Have Been Possible To See In Him A New Prometheus...the Hero Who For The Good Of Mankind Exposes Himself To The Agonies Of The Damned...undaunted By Failure, By An Unceasing Effort Of Courage Holding Despair At Bay, Doggedly Persistent In The Face Of Self-doubt, Which Is The Artist's Bitterest Enemy.

The Ideal Has Many Names, And Beauty Is But One Of Them.

A Little Smoke Lost In The Air, That Was The Life Of A Man.

We Do Not Write As We Want, But As We Can.

Do You Absolutely Despise Me, Walter?" "no." He Hesitated And His Voice Was Strange. "i Despise Myself.

As Lovers, The Difference Between Men And Women Is That Women Can Love All Day Long, But Men Only At Times.

It Is Clear That Men Accept An Immediate Pain Rather Than An Immediate Pleasure, But Only Because They Expect A Greater Pleasure In The Future. Often The Pleasure Is Illusory, But Their Error In Calculation Is No Refutation Of The Rule.

If A Man Hasn't What's Necessary To Make A Woman Love Him, It's His Fault, Not Hers.

I Always Find It More Difficult To Say The Things I Mean Than The Things I Don't.

Remember That It Is Nothing To Do Your Duty, That Is Demanded Of You And Is No More Meritorious Than To Wash Your Hands When They Are Dirty; The Only Thing That Counts Is The Love Of Duty; When Love And Duty Are One, Then Grace Is In You And You Will Enjoy A Happiness Which Passes All Understanding.

You Cannot Write Well Or Much (and I Venture The Opinion That You Cannot Write Well Unless You Write Much) Unless You Form A Habit.

Women's Hearts Are Like Old China, None The Worse For A Break Or Two.

No Egoism Is So Insufferable As That Of The Christian With Regard To His Soul.

It Is Good To Be On Your Guard Against An Englishman Who Speaks French Perfectly; He Is Very Likely To Be A Card-sharper Or An Attache In The Diplomatic Service.

Conscience Is The Guardian In The Individual Of The Rules Which The Community Has Evolved For Its Own Preservation.

Why Should You Think That Beauty, Which Is The Most Precious Thing In The World, Lies Like A Stone On The Beach For The Careless Passer-by To Pick Up Idly? Beauty Is Something Wonderful And Strange That The Artist Fashions Out Of The Chaos Of The World In The Torment Of His Soul. And When He Has Made It, It Is Not Given To All To Know It. To Recognize It You Must Repeat The Adventure Of The Artist. It Is A Melody That He Sings To You, And To Hear It Again In Your Own Heart You Want Knowledge And Sensitiveness And Imagination.

I Know That You're Selfish, Selfish Beyond Words, And I Know That You Haven't The Nerve Of A Rabbit, I Know You're A Liar And A Humbug, I Know That You're Utterly Contemptible. And The Tragic Part Is'--her Face Was On A Sudden Distraught With Pain--'the Tragic Part Is That Notwithstanding I Love You With All My Heart.

You Know, There Are Two Good Things In Life, Freedom Of Thought And Freedom Of Action. In France You Get Freedom Of Action: You Can Do What You Like And Nobody Bothers, But You Must Think Like Everybody Else. In Germany You Must Do What Everybody Else Does, But You May Think As You Choose. They're Both Very Good Things. I Personally Prefer Freedom Of Thought. But In England You Get Neither: You're Ground Down By Convention. You Can't Think As You Like And You Can't Act As You Like. That's Because It's A Democratic Nation. I Expect America's Worse.

Of All The Hokum With Which This Country [america] Is Riddled, The Most Odd Is The Common Notion That It Is Free Of Class Distinctions.

First, Cut Out All The Wisdom, Then Cut Out All The Adjectives.

It Must Be That To Govern A Nation You Need A Specific Talent And That This May Very Well Exist Without General Ability.

Evil Is A Necessary Part Of The Order Of The Universe.

Dullness Is The First Requisite Of A Good Husband.

An Unfortunate Thing About This World Is That The Good Habits Are Much Easier To Give Up Than The Bad Ones.

Unfortunate Things

I Want A Girl Because I Want To Bring Her Up So That She Shan't Make The Mistakes I've Made. When I Look Back Upon The Girl I Was I Hate Myself. But I Never Had A Chance. I'm Going To Bring Up My Daughter So That She's Free And Can Stand On Her Own Feet. I´m Not Going To Bring A Child Into The World, And Love Her, And Bring Her Up, Just So That Some Man May Want To Sleep With Her So Much That He's Willing To Provide Her With Board And Lodging For The Rest Of Her Life.

You Can Do Anything In This World If You Are Prepared To Take The Consequences.

Positive Thinking

What Mean And Cruel Things Men Can Do For The Love Of God.

The Ideas For Stories That Thronged My Brain Would Not Let Me Rest Till I Had Got Rid Of Them By Writing Them.

A Woman Will Always Sacrifice Herself If You Give Her The Opportunity. It Is Her Favourite Form Of Self Indulgence.

What Does Democracy Come Down To? The Persuasive Power Of Slogans Invented By Wily Self-seeking Politicians.

The Essential Element Of Love Is A Belief In Its Own Eternity.

Money Is Like A Sixth Sense Without Which You Cannot Make A Complete Use Of The Other Five.

Common Sense And Nature Will Do A Lot To Make The Pilgrimage Of Life Not Too Difficult.

I Knew That Suffering Did Not Enoble; It Degraded. It Made Men Selfish, Petty And Suspicious. It Absorbed Them In Small Things...it Made Them Less Than Men; And I Wrote Ferociously That We Learn Resignation Not By Our Own Suffering, But By The Suffering Of Others.

Suffering Of Others

Some American Delusions: 1) That There Is No Class-consciousness In The Country. 2) That American Coffee Is Good. 3) That Americans Are Business-like. 4) That Americans Are Highly-sexed And That Redheads Are More Highly Sexed Than Others.

It Is Cruel To Discover One's Mediocrity Only When It Is Too Late. It Does Not Improve The Temper.

Reserve Is An Artificial Quality That Is Developed In Most Of Us But As The Result Of Innumerable Rebuffs.

People Do Tell A Writer Things That They Don't Tell Others. I Don't Know Why, Unless It Is That Having Read One Or Two Of His Books They Feel On Peculiarly Intimate Terms With Him; Or It May Be That They Dramatize Themselves And, Seeing Themselves As It Were As Characters In A Novel, Are Ready To Be As Open With Him As They Imagine The Characters Of His Invention Are.

I Like Manual Labor. Whenever I've Got Waterlogged With Study, I've Taken A Spell Of It And Found It Spiritually Invigorating.

The Almighty Can Hardly Be Such A Fool As The Churches Make Out.

It Is Well To Remember That Grammar Is Common Speech Formulated.

Music-hall Songs Provide The Dull With Wit, Just As Proverbs Provide Them With Wisdom.

If You Can Tell Stories, Create Characters, Devise Incidents, And Have Sincerity And Passion, It Doesn't Matter A Damn How You Write.

A God That Can Be Understood Is No God. Who Can Explain The Infinite In Words?

I Daresay One Profits More By The Mistakes One Makes Off One's Own Bat Than By Doing The Right Thing On Somebody's Else Advice.

The Officers Saluted As She Passed And Gravely Bowed. They Walked Back Across The Courtyard And Got Into Their Chairs. She Saw Waddington Light A Cigarette. A Little Smoke Lost In The Air, That Was The Life Of A Man.

The Nature Of Men And Women - Their Essential Nature - Is So Vile And Despicable That If You Were To Portray A Person As He Really Is, No One Would Believe You.

Never Pause Unless You Have A Reason For It, But When You Pause, Pause As Long As You Can.

A Good Story Is Obviously A Difficult Thing To Invent, But Its Difficulty Is A Poor Reason For Despising It.

I Happen To Think We’ve Set Our Ideal On The Wrong Objects; I Happen To Think That The Greatest Ideal Man Can Set Before Himself Is Self-perfection.

We Americans... Like Change. It Is At Once Our Weakness And Our Strength.

Life Is Really Very Fantastic, And One Has To Have A Peculiar Sense Of Humour To See The Fun Of It. [virtue]

It Is Pleasure That Lurks In The Practice Of Every One Of Your Virtues. Man Performs Actions Because They Are Good For Him, And When They Are Good For Other People As Well They Are Thought Virtuous: If He Finds Pleasure In Helping Others He Is Benevolent; If He Finds Pleasure In Working For Society He Is Public-spirited; But It Is For Your Private Pleasure That You Give Twopence To A Beggar As Much As It Is For My Private Pleasure That I Drink Another Whiskey And Soda. I, Less Of A Humbug Than You, Neither Applaud Myself For My Pleasure Nor Demand Your Admiration.

Culture Is Not Just An Ornament; It Is The Expression Of A Nation's Character, And At The Same Time It Is A Powerful Instrument To Mould Character. The End Of Culture Is Right Living.

Let Us Develop The Resources Of Our Land, Call Forth Its Powers, Build Up Its Institutions, Promote All Its Great Interests, And See Whether We Also, In Our Day And Generation, May Not Perform Something Worthy To Be Remembered.

Self Improvement

The Value Of Money Is That With It We Can Tell Any Man To Go To The Devil. It Is The Sixth Sense Which Enables You To Enjoy The Other Five.

I Do Not Think You Want Too Much Sincerity In Society. It Would Be Like An Iron Girder In A House Of Cards.

Unfortunately Sometimes One Can't Do What One Thinks Is Right Without Making Someone Else Unhappy.

In Religion Above All Things The Only Thing Of Use Is An Objective Truth. The Only God That Is Of Use Is A Being Who Is Personal, Supreme And Good, And Whose Existence Is As Certain As That Two And Two Make Four.

She Loved Three Things — A Joke, A Glass Of Wine, And A Handsome Man.

Marriage Is A Very Good Thing, But I Think It's A Mistake To Make A Habit Out Of It.

I Do Not Believe They Are Right Who Say That The Defects Of Famous Men Should Be Ignored. I Think It Is Better That We Should Know Them. Then, Though We Are Conscious Of Having Faults As Glaring As Theirs, We Can Believe That That Is No Hindrance To Our Achieving Also Something Of Their Virtues.

Heaven Knows What Pains The Author Has Been At, What Bitter Experience He Has Endured And What Heartache Suffered, To Give Some Chance Reader A Few Hours' Relaxation Or To While Away The Tedium Of A Journey.

It's Asking A Great Deal That Things Should Appeal To Your Reason As Well As Your Sense Of The Aesthetic. - Of Human Bondage

[money] Is The String With Which A Sardonic Destiny Directs The Motions Of Its Puppets.

I Prefer A Loose Woman To A Selfish One And A Wanton To A Fool.

There Are Times When I Look Over The Various Parts Of My Character With Perplexity. I Recognize That I Am Made Up Of Several Persons And That The Person That At The Moment Has The Upper Hand Will Inevitably Give Place To Another. But Which Is The Real One? All Of Them Or None?

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Terrence McNally

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