Quote

I went for years not finishing anything. Because, of course, when you finish something you can be judged...I had poems which were re-written so many times I suspect it was just a way of avoiding sending them out.

Erica Jong

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Erica Jong
Age: 82
Born: 1942
Born: March 26
Author
Feminist
Novelist
Poet
Writer
New York City
New York
Erica Mann Jong
Something
Went
Finishing
Years
Courses
Sending
Way
Course
Suspect
Written
Suspects
Times
Avoiding
Anything
Poems
Many
Finish
Writing
Judged

More quotes by Erica Jong

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Memory is the most transient of all possessions. And when it goes, it leaves as few traces as stars that have disappeared.
Erica Jong
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You must have a certain amount of maturity to be a poet. Seldom do sixteen-year-olds know themselves well enough.
Erica Jong
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Because I loved myself, I was loved.
Erica Jong
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When I was a ten-year old bookworm and used to kiss the dust jacket pictures of authors as if they were icons, it used to amaze me that these remote people could provoke me to love.
Erica Jong
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Unhappiness is our element. We come to believe we can't function without it.
Erica Jong
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I have a very sensitive nose. I identify with dogs. I understand the world through my nose.
Erica Jong
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Any system was a straightjacket if you insisted on adhering to it so totally and humorlessly.
Erica Jong
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It's easier to write about pain than about joy. Joy is wordless.
Erica Jong
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It is a sad paradox that when male authors impersonate women ... they are said to be dealing with 'cosmic, major concerns' - but when we impersonate ourselves we are said to be writing 'women's fiction' or 'women's poetry.
Erica Jong
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If you imagine the world listening, you'll never write a line. That's why privacy is so important. You should write first drafts as if they will never be shown to anyone.
Erica Jong
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Women tend to be preservers of the social structure, of marriage. They don't want to upset their husbands or their significant others. They don't want to hurt people.
Erica Jong
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The Passion that one Soul hath for God cannot be judged by another.
Erica Jong
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As a reader, I want a book to kidnap me into its world. Its world must make my so-called real world seem flimsy. Its world must lure me to return. When I close the book, I should feel bereft.
Erica Jong
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You must find the right voice (or voices) for the timbre that can convince a reader to give himself up to you.
Erica Jong
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Souls have neither Sex nor Colour.
Erica Jong
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You see a lot of smart guys with dumb women, but you hardly ever see a smart woman with a dumb guy.
Erica Jong
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Anger is really disappointed hope.
Erica Jong
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I think the Jews are an amazing group of people and their survival is amazing.
Erica Jong
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It is for this, partly, that I write. How can I know what I think unless I see what I write.
Erica Jong
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Birth is the start of loneliness and loneliness the start of poetry.
Erica Jong