Writing Quotes
The page is led by Shakespeare, then William Zinsser, the author of On Writing Well, followed by Horace and Orwell. Three old sources are worth knowing: Bacon’s Meditationes Sacræ (1597) says reading makes a full man, conference a ready man and writing an exact man; Thoreau’s journal for 1838 says it is vain to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live; and Horace’s Ars Poetica is the source for the idea that the writer wins by mixing profit with pleasure.
“Writing is like sex. First you do it for love, then for your friends, then for money” is credited to Virginia Woolf and flagged misattributed. The notes quote an anecdote from a Tyrol coffee-house in which someone else says something similar. Two more flagged lines are credited to Cicero and to Menander.
Our words are giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a service.
The four most expensive words in the English language are "this time it’s different."
If our hearts were truly pure, we would never have our fill of the words of your Lord.
Some writings could sometimes, in moments of grace, attain the quality of deeds.
The connotation of the Sanskrit word for a hell, Naraka, is a joyless.
Did I say that? One says so many things, and the problem is they all get written down.
International community content with speeches without any real action.