Definition of a classic: a book everyone is assumed to have read and often thinks they have.

Definition of a classic: a book everyone is assumed to have read and often thinks they have.

I think we must quote whenever we feel that the allusion is interesting or helpful or amusing.

I think we must quote whenever we feel that the allusion is interesting or helpful or amusing.

A quotation, like a pun, should come unsought, and then be welcomed only for some propriety of felicity justifying the read more

A quotation, like a pun, should come unsought, and then be welcomed only for some propriety of felicity justifying the intrusion.

Quotation... A writer expresses himself in words that have been used before because they give his meaning better than he read more

Quotation... A writer expresses himself in words that have been used before because they give his meaning better than he can give it himself, or because they are beautiful or witty, or because he expects them to touch a cord of association in his reader, or because he wishes to show that he is learned and well read. Quotations due to the last motive are invariably ill-advised; the discerning reader detects it and is contemptuous; the undiscerning is perhaps impressed, but even then is at the same time repelled, pretentious quotations being the surest road to tedium.

The free-lance writer is a man who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps.

The free-lance writer is a man who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps.

The biggest critics of my books are people who never read them.

The biggest critics of my books are people who never read them.

Keep your words sweet -- you may have to eat them. I expect to pass through this world but once; read more

Keep your words sweet -- you may have to eat them. I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Criticism is a misconception: we must read not to understand others but to understand ourselves.

Criticism is a misconception: we must read not to understand others but to understand ourselves.

In America only the successful writer is important, in France all writers are important, in England no writer is important, read more

In America only the successful writer is important, in France all writers are important, in England no writer is important, and in Australia you have to explain what a writer is.