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For this is the journey that men and women make, to find themselves. If they fail in this, it doesn't matter much else what they find.

James A. Michener

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James A. Michener
Age: 90 †
Born: 1907
Born: February 3
Died: 1997
Died: October 16
Author
Autobiographer
Military Officer
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
New York City
New York
James Albert Michener
James Michener
Find
Matter
Much
Fail
Make
Failing
Men
Journey
Doesn
Else
Women

More quotes by James A. Michener

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The chief character in this narrative is the Caribbean Sea, one of the world's most alluring bodies of water, a rare gem among the oceans, defined by the islands that form a chain of lovely jewels to the north and east
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In six pages, I can't even say Hello.
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A writer can make a fortune in America, but he can't make a living.
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Things are going to go wrong, and I think we are false to life if we don’t portray it. But there is also the hope that some lucky clown is going to come along and stumble into the gold mine. And I think you are also entitled to hold out that hope.
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A poet sees things in two ways: First, as a child who never saw it before, and Second, as a dying man who will never see it again.
James A. Michener
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I think the bottom line is that if you get through a childhood like mine, it's not at all bad. Obviously, you come out a pretty tough turkey, and you have had all the inoculations you need to keep you on a level keel for the rest of your life. The sad part is, most of us don't come out.
James A. Michener
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All I can do is play the game the way the cards fall.
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The decent thing to do is to get rid of some of this money.
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The permanent temptation of life is to confuse dreams with reality. The permanent defeat of life comes when dreams are surrendered to reality.
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I am always interested in why young people become writers, and from talking with many I have concluded that most do not want to be writers working eight and ten hours a day and accomplishing little they want to have been writers, garnering the rewards of having completed a best-seller. They aspire to the rewards of writing but not to the travail.
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Writers turn dreams into print.
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If a man happens to find himself, he has a mansion which he can inhabit with dignity all the days of his life.
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The extreme geniality of San Francisco's economic, intellectual and political climate makes it the most varied and challenging city in the United States.
James A. Michener
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I was once asked if I'd like to meet the president of a certain country. I said, No, but I'd love to meet some sheepherders. The sheepherders, farmers and taxi drivers are often the most interesting people.
James A. Michener
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The job of a storyteller is to tell stories, and I have concentrated on that obligation.
James A. Michener
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There are no insoluble problems. Only time-consuming ones.
James A. Michener
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America is a nation with many flaws, but hopes so vast that only the cowardly would refuse to acknowledge them.
James A. Michener
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I wondered how a man ever got an English girl into bed. What did they do with her hockey stick?
James A. Michener
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Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth tries.
James A. Michener
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As a writer I have persisted in my uncertainty, alternating between novels which could charitably be considered literature and world reporting which by another stretch of objective standards might be called history.
James A. Michener