Others

The highest reward for a person’s toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it.

The true wisdom is to always be seasonable, and to change with a good grace in changing circumstances.

The beginning of wisdom is the definition of the terms.

Patience is the companion of wisdom.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

To do great work, a man must be very idle as well as very industrious.

Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?

In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate.

Logic: The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding.

As long as you live, keep learning how to live.

Truth, when not sought after, rarely comes to light.

The difficulty is to try and teach the multitude that something can be true and untrue at the same time.

I N THE AFTERNOONS , Gertrude Stein and I used to go antique hunting in the local shops, and I remember once asking her if she thought I should become a writer. In the typically cryptic way we were all so enchanted with, she said, “No.” I took that to mean yes and sailed for Italy the next day.

I N THE AFTERNOONS , Gertrude Stein and I used to go antique hunting in the local shops, and I remember once asking her if she thought I should become a writer. In the typically cryptic way we were all so enchanted with, she said, “No.” I took that to mean yes and sailed for Italy the next day.

Don’t ever write anything you don’t like yourself and if you do like it, don’t take anyone else’s advice about changing it. They just don’t know.

Don’t ever write anything you don’t like yourself and if you do like it, don’t take anyone else’s advice about changing it. They just don’t know.

There is no advice to give young poets.

I don’t think that writer’s block exists really. I think that when you’re trying to do something prematurely, it just won’t come. Certain subjects just need time.… You’ve got to wait before you write about them.

Ignore it: you never stop speaking; why stop writing?

My prescription for writer’s block is to face the fact that there is no such thing. It’s an invented condition, a literary version of the judicial “abuse excuse.” Writing well is difficult, but one can always write something . And then, with a lot of work, make it better. It’s a question of having enough will and ambition, not of hoping to evade this mysterious hysteria people are always talking about.

When I sit down in order to write, sometimes it’s there; sometimes it’s not. But that doesn’t bother me anymore. I tell my students there is such a thing as “writer’s block,” and they should respect it. You shouldn’t write through it. It’s blocked because it ought to be blocked, because you haven’t got it right now.

If you are in difficulties with a book, try the element of surprise: attack it at an hour when it isn’t expecting it.

The best regimen is to get up early, insult yourself a bit in the shaving mirror, and then pretend you’re cutting wood.

Now this is very important and can hardly be emphasized too strongly: You have decided to write at four o’clock, and at four o’clock write you must!