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Two questions form the foundation of all novels: What if? and What next? (A third question, What now?, is one the author asks himself every 10 minutes or so but it's more a cry than a question.) Every novel begins with the speculative question, What if X happened? That's how you start.

Tom Clancy

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Tom Clancy
Age: 66 †
Born: 1947
Born: April 12
Died: 2013
Died: October 1
Non-Fiction Writer
Novelist
Prosaist
Writer
Baltimore
Maryland
Thomas Leo Clancy Jr.
Thomas Leo Tom Clancy Jr.
Thomas Leo Tom Clancy
Jr.
Thomas Clancy
Thomas L. Clancy
Every
Minutes
Author
Question
Third
Happened
Thirds
Asks
Begins
Start
Cry
Next
Foundation
Two
Questions
Speculative
Form
Novel
Novels

More quotes by Tom Clancy

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Bill Clinton is a man who thinks international affairs means dating a girl from out of town.
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The smaller the mind, the greater the ego.
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Fix your eyes forward on what you can do, not back on what you cannot change.
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The Good of the People was a laudable enough goal, but in denying a man's soul, an enduring part of his being, Marxism stripped away the foundation of human dignity and individual value. It also cast aside the objective measure of justice and ethics which, he decided, was the principal legacy of religion to civilized life.
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I wanted to see my name on the cover of a book. If your name is in the Library of Congress, you're immortal.
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There are two kinds of people: the ones who need to be told and the ones who figure it out all by themselves.
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Wars are begun by frightened men.
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I am a politician which means I am a liar and a crook. When I am not kissing babies I am stealing their lollypops.
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I think it's an intellectual duty for a person who lives in a free society to read material not only with which you agree, but with which you disagree. Because every so often somebody you think is wrong will actually turn out to be right.
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The point of life was to press on, to do the best you can, to make the world a better place.
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I understand why we do that now. It’s a help, not a threat. It’s something to remind you how important words are. Ideas are important. Principles are important. Words are important. Your word is the most important of all. Your word is who you are.
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In battle, you forgive a man anything except an unwillingness to take risks. Sometimes you have to put it on the line.
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People, I am actually fairly smart. Why has this not occurred to anyone? The information is all out there, if you go looking for it, and the classified stuff just comes from analyzing the unclassified stuff and connecting the dots.
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The only real difference between a wise man and a fool, Moore knew, was that the wise man tended to make more serious mistakes—and only because no one trusted a fool with really crucial decisions only the wise had the opportunity to lose battles, or nations.
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I write strictly for fun... as long as it stays fun I'll continue to do it.
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Once you stop believing in Santa Claus, the whole world just goes downhill.
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There is more to military units than hardware. There is the character of the unit's personnel: their strengths, experience, and knowledge, their ability to get along and work together amid the horrors of the battlefield. There is an almost undefinable quality. That quality is the Marine Corps' secret weapon. Their edge. That quality is their ethos.
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When you have stopped learning you have begun to die.
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In the Soviet Union it was illegal to take a photograph of a train station. Look what happened to them. They tried to classify everything.
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The human condition today is better than it's ever been, and technology is one of the reasons for that.
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