William Saroyan
I do not know what makes a writer, but it probably isn’t happiness. — William Saroyan, The Bicycle Rider in Beverly Hills ( Charles Scribner’s Sons; 1st edition, January 1, 1952)
Category: Autobiographical
Annie Dillard
How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. ― Annie Dillard, The Writing Life (Harper Perennial, November 12, 2013)
Frederick Buechner
It was the upward-reaching and fathomlessly hungering, heart-breaking love for the beauty of the world at its most beautiful, and, beyond that, for that beauty east of the sun and west of the moon which is past the reach of all but our most desperate desiring and is finally the beauty of Beauty itself, of… Continue reading Frederick Buechner
Truman Capote
As for me, I could leave the world with today in my eyes. — Truman Capote, A Christmas Memory (Alfred A. Knopf, 2006, first published in 1956)
Charles Simic
One writes because one has been touched by the yearning for and the despair of ever touching the Other. ― Charles Simic, The Unemployed Fortune-Teller: Essays and Memoirs ( University of Michigan Press, February 15th 1995) Originally published 1995.
Franz Kafka
I have this vision: That I would finally come and find you. Scattered pieces of distance would not stand in my way. Not needing words; the barest of glimpses would suffice for you and me. – Franz Kafka, Letters To Milena (Schocken; Rev Upd edition April 7, 1990)
Ernest Hemingway
When spring came, even the false spring, there were no problems except where to be happiest. The only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good… Continue reading Ernest Hemingway
Rebecca Solnit
We treat desire as a problem to be solved, address what desire is for and focus on that something and how to acquire it rather than on the nature and the sensation of desire, though often it is the desire between us and the object of desire that fills the space in between with the… Continue reading Rebecca Solnit
James Salter
A writer cannot really grasp what he has written. It is not like a building or a sculpture; it cannot be seen whole. It is only a kind of smoke seized and printed on a page. — James Salter, Burning the Days: Recollection (Knopf Doubleday, 2011)
Albert Camus
There are some individuals who have too strong a craving, a will, and a nostalgia for happiness ever to reach it. They always retain a bitter and passionate aftertaste, and that’s the best they can hope for. — Albert Camus, Correspondence, 1932-1960. (University of Nebraska Press; annotated edition edition May 1, 2003)
The Vale of Soul-Making 