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Annie Dillard: Crystals grew inside...

Annie Dillard: Crystals grew inside...

Crystals grew inside rock like arithmetic flowers. They lengthened and spread, added plane to plane in an awed and...

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Agatha Christie: I don't think...

Agatha Christie: I don't think...

I don't think necessity is the mother of invention -- invention . . . arises directly from idleness, possibly also...

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Katherine Paterson: Youth is a...

Katherine Paterson: Youth is a...

Youth is a mortal wound

Source: Jacob Have I Loved, 1980.
-- Katherine Paterson,...

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Harper Lee: Real courage is...

Harper Lee: Real courage is...

Real courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter...

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Lisa Alther: I happen to...

Lisa Alther: I happen to...

I happen to feel that the degree of a person's intelligence is directly reflected by the number of conflicting...

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Nadine Gordimer: Censorship is never...

Nadine Gordimer: Censorship is never...

Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the...

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Elizabeth Stuart Phelps: It is not...

Elizabeth Stuart Phelps: It is not...

It is not the straining for great things that is most effective; it is the doing the little things, the common duties,...

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Amy Tan: Who knows where...

Amy Tan: Who knows where...

Who knows where inspiration comes from? Perhaps it arises from desperation. Perhaps it comes from the flukes of the...

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Mary Stewart: But I have...

Mary Stewart: But I have...

But I have noticed this about ambitious men, or men in power -- they fear even the slightest and least likely threat...

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Shirley Jackson: [L]et my reader...

Shirley Jackson: [L]et my reader...

[L]et my reader who is puzzled by my awkward explanations close his eyes for no more than two minutes, and see if he...

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Grace Metalious: . ....

Grace Metalious: . ....

. . . to talk about adults without talking about their sex drives is like talking about a window without...

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Emmuska Orczy: An apology?...

Emmuska Orczy: An apology?...

An apology? Bah! Disgusting! Cowardly! Beneath the dignity of any gentleman, however wrong he might...

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Margaret Truman: It's only when...

Margaret Truman: It's only when...

It's only when you grow up, and step back from him, or leave him for your own career and your own home it's only then...

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Lois McMaster Bujold: His mother had...

Lois McMaster Bujold: His mother had...

His mother had often said, When you choose an action, you choose the consequences of that action. She had emphasized...

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Joyce Brothers: Psychologically, having it...

Joyce Brothers: Psychologically, having it...

Psychologically, having it all is not a valid concept. The marvelous thing about human beings is that we are...

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Ursula Le Guin: It is good...

Ursula Le Guin: It is good...

It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters in the...

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Enid Bagnold: Dead news like...

Enid Bagnold: Dead news like...

Dead news like dead love has no phoenix in its ashes.

Source: National Velvet/...

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Margaret Atwood: If the national...

Margaret Atwood: If the national...

If the national mental illness of the United States is megalomania, that of Canada is paranoid...

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Edith Wharton: I have never...

Edith Wharton: I have never...

I have never known a novel that was good enough to be good in spite of its being adapted to the author's political...

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Cynthia Ozick: I'm not afraid...

Cynthia Ozick: I'm not afraid...

I'm not afraid of facts, I welcome facts but a congeries of facts is not equivalent to an idea. This is the essential...

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