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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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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
United
Extreme
Makes
Extremes
Political
Climate
States
Intellectual
City
Geniality
Cities
Varied
Challenges
Francisco
Economic
Challenging

More quotes by James A. Michener

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If your book doesn't keep you up nights when you are writing it, it won't keep anyone up nights reading it.
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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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You write that first draft really to see how it's going to come out.
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No man leaves where he is and seeks a distant place unless he is in some respect a failure.
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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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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.
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I have never thought of myself as a good writer. Anyone who wants reassurance of that should read one of my first drafts. But I'm one of the world's great rewriters.
James A. Michener
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About a billion years ago, long before the continents had separated to define the ancient oceans, or their own outlines had been determined, a small protuberance jutted out from the northwest corner of what would later become North America.
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The really great writers are people like Emily Brontë who sit in a room and write out of their limited experience and unlimited imagination.
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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
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[The church's] job is to provide permanent solace and spiritual leadership to the people as a whole, whatever their government at the moment, so long as it stays within the bounds of moral decency.
James A. Michener
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Every animal that walks the earth, or swims, or flies is precious beyond description, something so rare and wonderful that it equals the stars or the ocean or the mind of man.
James A. Michener
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The sense of belonging is one of the great gifts men get in battle.
James A. Michener
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You don't fight to protect warships or old men. Like the book says, you fight to save your civilization. And so often it seems that civilization is composed mainly of the things women and children want.
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
James A. Michener
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a soldier lives always for the next battle, because he knows that before it arrives impossible changes can occur in his favor.
James A. Michener
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I've spent my life trying to be better than I was, and I am a brother to all who share the same aspiration.
James A. Michener
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It takes courage to know when you ought to be afraid.
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An age is called Dark not because the light fails to shine, but because people refuse to see it.
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...when men ignite in their hearts a religious fury, they inflict at the same time a blindness on their eyes.
James A. Michener