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Egyptologists, skilled in piecing together the papyri of lost civilisations, suddenly discovered that the same talent could be applied to working out the pattern of German radio traffic.

Robert Harris

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Robert Harris
Age: 67
Born: 1957
Born: March 7
Journalist
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Writer
Kidderminster
Worcestershire
Robert Dennis Harris
Patterns
Civilisations
Suddenly
Skilled
Radio
Civilisation
Talent
Applied
Working
Traffic
History
German
Lost
Pattern
Together
Discovered
Piecing

More quotes by Robert Harris

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By dawn he had surrendered, gratefully, to the old inertia, the product of always seeing both sides of every question.
Robert Harris
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Don't try to write too much in a single session. One thousand words a day is quite enough. Stop after about four or five hours.
Robert Harris
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Politics? Boring? Politics is history on the wing! What other sphere of human activity calls forth all that is most noble in men's souls, and all that is most base? Or has such excitement? Or more vividly exposes our strengths and weaknesses? Boring? You might as well say that life itself is boring!
Robert Harris
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Humans have changed little over time. We think we've invented the modern world but they were making better speeches 2,000 years ago and grappling with issues of empire and terrorism.
Robert Harris
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First comes an idea. Then, characters begin to evolve out of the landscape of that idea. And then, finally, characters dominate: plot is simply a function of what these people might do or be. Everything has to flow from their personalities otherwise it will not be emotionally engaging, or plausible.
Robert Harris
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History is too important to be left to the historians.
Robert Harris
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Of all human activities, writing is the one for which it is easiest to find excuses not to begin – the desk’s too big, the desk’s too small, there’s too much noise, there’s too much quiet, it’s too hot, too cold, too early, too late. I had learned over the years to ignore them all, and simply to start.
Robert Harris
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[Boxer is] the ultimate tool for the serious pro' that can't afford the time and patience to mess around with lesser products.
Robert Harris
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Suicide leaves everyone feeling guilty.
Robert Harris
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Cicero most reminds me of Harold Wilson. Both men knew how to keep the show on the road.
Robert Harris
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You can't make sense of the present unless a part of you lives in the past.
Robert Harris
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I think it's very, very hard not to go slightly crazy if you're in the top in politics, especially if you're there for a long time.
Robert Harris
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I've always just wanted to earn my living by writing. The best thing is to go into my study in the morning and stay there and put words together.
Robert Harris
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It is perseverance, and not genius that takes a man to the top. Rome is full of unrecognized geniuses. Only perseverance enables you to move forward in the world.
Robert Harris
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To say she was my girlfriend was absurd: no one the wrong side of thirty has a girlfriend… I suppose I ought to have realize it’s ominous that forty thousand years of human language had failed to produce a word for our relationship.
Robert Harris
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Working 14 hours a day until you're 55 and missing your kids growing up is not what I would consider a recipe for happiness.
Robert Harris
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Tape is the archiving champ and has been for decades. Reliable, less expensive than disks and available in large-scale robotic systems that store petabytes.
Robert Harris
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Everyone thinks politics will just go on the way it is. I don't agree.
Robert Harris
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My greatest regret as a writer is that I've never been able to include as many jokes as I'd like.
Robert Harris
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One cannot see any world leader who has got a grip on the financial markets these days. They're too big, too fast. I think that's quite scary.
Robert Harris