Quote

There are no taboos. Every topic is open, however shocking. It is the way that the topics are handled that's important, and that applies whether it is a 15-year-old who is reading your book or someone who is 55.

Robert Cormier

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Robert Cormier
Age: 75 †
Born: 1925
Born: January 17
Died: 2000
Died: November 2
Author
Journalist
Writer
Bay State
Robert Edmund Cormier
Whether
Applies
Someone
Taboo
Book
Topics
Important
Shocking
Every
However
Years
Open
Taboos
Way
Year
Handled
Reading
Topic

More quotes by Robert Cormier

Image
Why did the wise guys always accuse other people of being wise guys?
Robert Cormier
Image
We often think that tragedies happen because of great earthquakes in people's lives. I think they sometimes occur because of small things that become obsessive to a particular person.
Robert Cormier
Image
I read a lot of detective stories because they always deliver. They give you a beginning, a middle, and an end - a resolution. The modern novels I read don't always deliver because I'm looking essentially for a story. As in Shakespeare, The play's the thing. In particular I read detective stories for pacing, plot and suspense.
Robert Cormier
Image
Cities fell. Earth opened. Planets tilted. Stars plummeted. And the awful silence.
Robert Cormier
Image
I don't think I began to be a professional writer until I learned my weaknesses and what I couldn't do. This forced me to compensate.
Robert Cormier
Image
They don't actually want you to do your own thing, not unless it's their thing too.
Robert Cormier
Image
I'm always telling myself as I write that I'm not really writing a novel I'm just going to fool around with a character or an idea.
Robert Cormier
Image
He was swept with a sadness, a sadness deep and penetrating, leaving him desolate like someone washed up on a beach, a lone survivor in a world full of strangers.
Robert Cormier
Image
Kids tell me all the time, I don't know how you do it, but that's us in the book. That's the kind of response you want, and I can't sacrifice it for the sake of somebody worried about censorship. You have to find a way to be truthful and honest.
Robert Cormier
Image
I can't remember a time when I wasn't trying to get something down on paper.
Robert Cormier
Image
I've had aunts and uncles who not only haven't read my books but could hardly believe that I was a writer.
Robert Cormier
Image
As much as there is joy in writing, there's always the little bit of terror to keep you on edge, on your toes. It is a strange way to occupy yourself - to enjoy your life on a daily basis. There is no guarantee that something great is going to come next.
Robert Cormier
Image
It would be nice to avoid the world, to leave it and all its threats and unhappiness. Not to die or anything like that, but to find a place of solitude and solace.
Robert Cormier
Image
You have to accept the critical reviews if they treat you with respect. Actually, it's one person's opinion. So, it's a concern but not an overriding one, and I don't stay up nights worrying about reviews. But there are certain people I respect who I hope will like a book.
Robert Cormier
Image
I have lived a thousand lives lost within the pages of a book.
Robert Cormier
Image
Writing, even though it's hard work, is really a joy when you get these characters to come alive. It's hard to trace where they come from. I can't say that I am sitting here one night at nine o'clock and that a character occurs to me. The magic for me happens at the typewriter.
Robert Cormier
Image
A terrific sadness swept over Jerry. As if somebody had died. The way he felt standing in the cemetry that day they buried his mother. And nothing you could do about it.
Robert Cormier
Image
You hope that people read your book and say Yes, this is the way it is or could be. But then you have no way of knowing until the reader reads the book. Actually, the critical response doesn't worry me. I've had very few reviews that have upset me.
Robert Cormier
Image
It came to me that hell would not be fire and smoke after all but arctic, everything white and frigid. Hell would be not anger but indifference.
Robert Cormier
Image
I simply write with an intelligent reader in mind. I don't think about how old they are.
Robert Cormier