Quote

People have got that ancient prejudice so firmly rooted in their heads that one mustn't write save at I the dictation of the Holy Spirit. I tell you, writing is a business.

George Gissing

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George Gissing
Age: 46 †
Born: 1857
Born: January 1
Died: 1903
Died: January 1
Novelist
Writer
George R. Gissing
G. R. Gissing
George Robert Gissing
Writing
Prejudice
People
Ancient
Save
Holy
Dictation
Business
Mustn
Write
Firmly
Tell
Rooted
Spirit
Heads

More quotes by George Gissing

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Parks are but pavement disguised with a growth of grass.
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To every man it is decreed: Thou shalt live alone. Happy they who imagine that they have escaped the common lot happy, whilst they imagine it.
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For the man sound of body and serene of mind there is no such thing as bad weather every day has its beauty, and storms which whip the blood do but make it pulse more vigorously.
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Literature nowadays is a trade... the successful man of letters is your skilful tradesman. He thinks first and foremost of the markets.
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I hate with a bitter hatred the names of lentils haricots - those pretentious cheats of the appetite, those tabulated humbugs, those certified aridites calling themselves human food!
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It is our duty never to speak ill of others, you know least of all when we know that to do so will be the cause of much pain and trouble.
George Gissing
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Human creatures have a mervellous power of adapting themselves to necessity.
George Gissing
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For one thing, I know every book of mine by its scent.
George Gissing
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Money is time. With money I buy for cheerful use the hours which otherwise would not in any sense be mine nay, which would make me their miserable bondsman.
George Gissing
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Money is made at Christmas out of holly and mistletoe, but who save the vendors would greatly care if no green branch were procurable?
George Gissing
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Have the courage of your desire.
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And why should any man who writes, even if he writes things immortal, nurse anger at the world's neglect? Who asked him to publish? Who promised him a hearing? Who has broken faith with him? Your poem, your novel, who bargained with you for it?
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Life is a huge farce, and the advantage of possessing a sense of humour is that it enables one to defy fate with mocking laughter.
George Gissing
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I am much better employed from every point of view, when I live solely for my own satisfaction, than when I begin to worry about the world. The world frightens me, and a frightened man is no good for anything.
George Gissing
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In nothing more is the English genius for domesticity more notably declared than in the institution of this festival-almost one may call it-of afternoon tea...the mere chink of cups and saucers tunes the mind to happy repose.
George Gissing
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That is one of the bitter curses of poverty it leaves no right to be generous.
George Gissing
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London is a huge shop, with a hotel on the upper storeys.
George Gissing
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Life, I fancy, would very often be insupportable, but for the luxury of self compassion.
George Gissing
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Flippancy, the most hopeless form of intellectual vice.
George Gissing
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I know every book of mine by its smell, and I have but to put my nose between the pages to be reminded of all sorts of things.
George Gissing