American Author Quotes

The best hiding spots are not the most hidden; they're merely the least searched.

You'd scarce expect one of my age
To speak in public on the stage;
And if I chance to fall below
Demosthenes or Cicero,
Don't view me with a critic's eye,
But pass my imperfections by.
Large streams from little fountains flow,
Tall oaks from little acorns grow.

We can only do what is possible for us to do. But still it is good to know what the impossible is.

María Irene Fornés

We are striving to forge our union with purpose.
To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters, and conditions of man.

Those who do not know how to see the precious things in life will never be happy.

So I cradle this average violin that knows
Only forgotten showtunes, but argues
The possibility of free declamation anchored
To a dull refrain....

The abyss is full of reality, the abyss experiences itself, the abyss is alive.

The big picture is that there is no big picture.
That's why we keep painting it.

Ronald Sukenick

You don't learn to write by going through a series of preset writing exercises. You learn to write by grappling with a real subject that truly matters to you.

I say to my breath once again, little breath come from in front of me, go away behind me, row me quietly now, as far as you can, for I am an abyss that I am trying to cross.

You will not fight your battles on my body anymore.

Only once you destroy who you think you are can you embrace who you truly are

The view from the window, particularly if you enjoy neon, is extraordinary.

Chris Bachelder

Because systems of mass communication can communicate only officially acceptable levels of reality, no one can know the extent of the secret unconscious life. No one in America can know what will happen. No one is in real control.

Tell me thou all pervading mind,
When I this life forsake,
Must ev'ry tender tie unbind,
Each sweet connection break?

Ann Eliza Bleecker

People are all the same. We need a personal reason to get our asses off the couch.

Olen Steinhauer

The soul of the river had entered my soul, And the gathered power of my soul was moving So swiftly, it seemed to be at rest Under cities of cloud and under Spheres of silver and changing worlds Until I saw a flash of trumpets Above the battlements over Time!

Edgar Lee Masters

As a writer, I have always considered it my job to describe the world as I know it; to struggle toward whatever portion of the truth is available to me,

Loaded with note cards for research papers that I was hopelessly behind on, I'd enter the Public Library only to end up wandering around lost, wasting the day.

Hollywood – a place where the inmates are in charge of the asylum.

Laurence Stallings

All my life, I knew, all my life I would be haunted by words from Shakespeare.

Sarah Smith (writer)

The rules of marriage were simple and easy to follow: faithfulness, patience, compromise. But there were no rules to divorce, or if there were, he had not yet discovered them.

When and where will another come to take your holy place?
Old man mumbling in his dotage, or crying child, unborn?

Margaret Walker

To know a little less and to understand a little more: that, it seems to me, is our greatest need.

James Ramsey Ullman

So even the most unlikely events have to take place somewhere...

David Lindsay-Abaire