Quote

Talent is helpful in writing, but guts are absolutely necessary.

Jessamyn West

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jessamyn West
Age: 81 †
Born: 1902
Born: July 18
Died: 1984
Died: February 22
Author
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Indiana
United States
Mary Jessamyn West
Courage
Talent
Writing
Preconceptions
Guts
Helpful
Absolutely
Necessary

More quotes by Jessamyn West

Image
It is the loving, not the loved, woman who feels loveable.
Jessamyn West
Image
To meet at all, one must open ones eyes to another and there is no true conversation no matter how many words are spoken, unless the eye, unveiled and listening, opens itself to the other.
Jessamyn West
Image
In their sympathies, children feel nearer animals than adults. They frolic with animals, caress them, share with them feelings neither has words for. Have they ever stroked any adult with the love they bestow on a cat? Hugged any grownup with the ecstasy they feel when clasping a puppy?
Jessamyn West
Image
If you train people properly, they won't be able to tell a drill from the real thing. If anything, the real thing will be easier.
Jessamyn West
Image
It is not easy to be solitary unless you are also born ruthless. Every solitary repudiates someone.
Jessamyn West
Image
Justice is a terrible but necessary thing.
Jessamyn West
Image
In their sympathies, children feel nearer animals than adults
Jessamyn West
Image
There are two barriers that often prevent communication between the young and their elders. The first is middle-aged forgetfulness of the fact that they themselves are no longer young. The second is youthful ignorance of the fact that the middle aged are still alive.
Jessamyn West
Image
Only a fool would refuse to enter a fool's paradise when that's the only paradise he'll ever have a chance to enter.
Jessamyn West
Image
The conversation of two people remembering, if the memory is enjoyable to both, rocks on like music or lovemaking. There is a rhythm and a predictability to it that each anticipates and relishes.
Jessamyn West
Image
Somehow I have the feeling that in some book is the great treasure I've been looking for all my life.
Jessamyn West
Image
Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures.
Jessamyn West
Image
With enough libraries, all content is free.
Jessamyn West
Image
Memory is a magnet. It will pull to it and hold only material nature has designed it to attract.
Jessamyn West
Image
Writing is a solitary occupation. Family, friends, and society are the natural enemies of the writer. He must be alone, uninterrupted, and slightly savage if he is to sustain and complete an undertaking.
Jessamyn West
Image
The source of one's joy is also often the source of one's sorrow.
Jessamyn West
Image
A good time for laughing is when you can.
Jessamyn West
Image
We can love an honest rogue, but what is more offensive than a false saint?
Jessamyn West
Image
A rattlesnake that doesn't bite teaches you nothing.
Jessamyn West
Image
You make what seems a simple choice: choose a man or a job or a neighborhood- and what you have chosen is not a man or a job or a neighborhood, but a life.
Jessamyn West