Short All About Me Quotes & Sayings

You can't imagine fame. You can only ever see it from an outsider and comment on it with the rueful wisdom of a non participant. When it happens to you, it doesn't matter what age or how, it is a very steep learning curve. The imprtanot thing to realize in all of it is that life is short, to protect the ones you love, and not expose yourself to too much abuse or narcissistic reflection gazing and move on. If fame affords me the type of ability to do the kind of work I'm being offered, who am I to complain about the downsides. It's all relative. And this are obviously very high class problems. The way privacy becomes an every shrinking island is inevitable but also manageable and it doesn't necessary have to get that way ... — Benedict Cumberbatch

Originally I wanted somewhere to set my short stories about the sort of people I recognise having grown up with. Carnbeg was staring me in the face all the time, only I had somehow failed to see that. Not seeing the wood for the trees, I suppose. — Ronald Frame

Look here, Mrs. Bradley," he said. "I feel a pretty frightful bounder telling you all this about the poor girl, but I think some woman ought to know about it. On Wednesday night, yes, last night, Eleanor came into my bedroom at about half-past twelve and--and wanted to stay there! I thought it was a ghost at first. I had terrible difficulty in getting rid of her. In fact, I had to get out of bed and shove her outside and lock the door. Choice, isn't it?"
...
"Of course you will lock your door tonight," she said.
"You bet I shall," Bertie said fervently, "and nothing short of the house catching fire is going to persuade me to open it. — Gladys Mitchell

I've never been good at writing letters, so I hope you'll forgive me if I'm not able to make myself clear.
I've been thinking about you constantly since I left, wondering why the journey I'm on seemed to have led through you. I know my journey's not over yet, and that life is a winding path, but I can only hope it somehow circles back to the place I belong.
That's how I think of it now. I belong with you.
It is almost as if a part of you is with me. I want to believe that's true. No, change that - I know it's true. Before we met, I was as lost as a person could be, and yet you saw something in me that somehow gave me direction again. It was you, that I had been looking for all along. And it's you who is with me now.
I realize that I miss you more than I've ever missed anyone. In the short time we spent together, we had what most people can only dream about, and I'm counting the days until I can see you again. Never forget how much I love you. — Unknown

Let's all do it," said Mr. Watts. "Close your eyes and silently recite your name."
The sound of my name took me to a place deep inside my head. I already knew that words could take you into a new world, but I didn't know that on the strength of one word spoken for my ears only I would find myself in a room that no one else knew about.
"Another thing," Mr. Watts said. "No one in the history of your short lives has used the same voice as you with which to say your name. This is yours. Your special gift that no one can ever take from you. — Lloyd Jones

I love idleness. I love to busy myself about trifles, to begin a hundred things and not finish one of them, to come and go as my fancy bids me, to change my plan every moment, to follow a fly in all its circlings, to try and uproot a rock to see what is underneath, eagerly to begin a ten-years' task to give it up after ten minutes: in short, to fritter away the whole day inconsequentially and incoherently, and to follow nothing but the whim of the moment. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

I don't have any frustrations. It sounds a little silly, but life is too short for me. I don't worry about all the things that happen, I just think about what to do with them. I work a lot with blind people in my spare time and I count my blessings every day. — Paul Polman

At the heart of existentialist philosophy is the premise that all existence is absurd. Life has no meaning and death is the ultimate absurdity, But in the course of this absurd existence, man is forced to make choices, even if those choices may be about absurd issues. But man abhors this freedom of choice, a condition called 'existential angst'. Until we reach a time when most of our life lies behind us, we second guess ourselves interminably. 'What if I had done done this?' 'What if I had done that?' 'Could I have learnt from what others before me have done?' But that is a futile endeavor. It is just not possible to pass on the burden of decision-making to someone else, nor is it possible to learn from other's experiences. Every man has to make choices by falling back on his own experience. In short, man is condemned to be free. — Duvvuri Subbarao

I got comments about being too small, too short, there haven't been any Asian players and who am I to go out there and turn pro before my 16th birthday? And that's all good and fine. People want to have their comments and their opinions. Ultimately, you do what you believe in your heart. I think for me, things turned out OK. — Michael Chang

To all those who doubt the power of exercise -- and I was one of you -- take it from me: physical fitness has translated into an intellectual fitness I could not have imagined... I've learned that "I don't need to go for a run today" comes out of the same part of my brain as "I don't need to confront my vice president today about the low performance of his department." One suffer-session at a time, I have trained that part of my brain to endure short-term pain in exchange for long-term benefits. — Edward Stevens

Do you know that i paid two dollars for [Doxocology] thirty-three years ago? Everything was wrong with him, hoofs like flapjacks, a hock so thick and short and straight there seems no joint at all. he's hammerheaded and swaybacked. He has a pinched chest and a big behind. He has an iron mouth and he still fights the upper. with a saddle he feels as thought you were riding a sled over a gravel pit. He can't trot and he stumbles over his feet when he walks. I have never in thirty-three years fond one good thing about him. He even has an ugly disposition. He is selfish and quarrelsome and mean and disobedient. to this day I don't dare walk behind him because he will surely take a kick at me. when I feed him mush he tries to bite my hand. And I love him. — John Steinbeck

We lived on 82nd Street and the Metropolitan Museum was my short cut to Central Park. I wrote:
"I go into the museum
and look at all the pictures on the walls.
Instead of feeling my own insignificance
I want to go straight home and paint."
A great painting, or symphony, or play, doesn't diminish us, but enlarges us, and we, too, want to make our own cry of affirmation to the power of creation behind the universe. This surge of creativity has nothing to do with competition, or degree of talent. When I hear a superb pianist, I can't wait to get to my own piano, and I play about as well now as I did when I was ten. A great novel, rather than discouraging me, simply makes me want to write. This response on the part of any artist is the need to make incarnate the new awareness we have been granted through the genius of someone else. — Madeleine L'Engle

Anyone who criticises me for talking about fair trade is a few pebbles short of a beach. Because everyone should care about it, just like everyone should care about the environment, because we all live here. — Chris Martin

Another stereotype I spent a lot of time batting down: that Christians were all spittle-spewing hatemongers. I met a few of those in my travels, of course, but they struck me as a distinct minority. Wonbo and I - two nonreligious New Yorkers, one of them gay, the other gay-friendly - were never treated with anything short of respect. Often, in fact, what we found was kindness, hospitality, and curiosity. Yes, people would always ask whether we were believers, but when we said no, there were never gasps or glares. They may have thought we were going to hell, but they were perfectly nice about it. — Dan Harris

My tutor was a film director on the side, and she introduced me to film. She then put me in one of her short films, and it came out of that. That's when I fell in love with the process of making a film. After that, I was about 15 and I was like, "This is what I've gotta do." So, I started taking acting lessons, and then I applied to college to do acting. I got an agent, and it all just happened. — Eve Hewson

You don't know me at all.
You don't know the first thing about me. You don't know where I'm writing this from. You don't know what I look like. You have no power over me.
What do you think I look like? Skinny? Freckles? Wire-rimmed glasses over brown eyes? No, I don't think so. Better look again. Deeper. It's like a kaleidoscope, isn't it? One minute I'm short, the next minute tall, one minute I'm geeky, one minute studly, my shape constantly changes, and the only thing that stays constant is my brown eyes. Watching you. — David Klass

Whenever we could steal a few minutes alone, that's when we became the "other", the charged-up thing that kept me up at night, afraid of falling so fast, afraid of losing, afraid it wouldn't last once everyone found out. We stole too-short kisses in the front hallway, shared knowing and devious looks across the table when we weren't being watched. We snuck out every night behind the house to watch for shooting stars and whisper about life, our favorite books, about the meaning of songs. It wasn't the topics themselves that changed, we had talked about all of those things befores. But now, there was a new intensity, an urgency to know as much as we could, to fit as much as possible into our final nights, before somebody found out. — Sarah Ockler

He sipped again, more deeply. "Is this an interrogation, Lieutenant?" It was the smile in his voice that rubbed her wrong.
"It can be," she said shortly.
"As you like." He rose, set his glass aside, and began to unbutton his shirt.
"What are you doing?"
"Getting into the swim, so to speak." He tossed the shirt aside, unhooked his trousers.
"If I'm going to be questioned by a naked cop, in my own tub, the least I can do is join her."
"Damn it, Roarke, this is murder." He winced as the hot water all but scalded him.
"You're telling me." He faced her across the sea of froth.
"What is it in me that is so perverse it thrives on ruffling you? And," he continued before she could give him her short, pithy opinion, "what is it about you that pulls at me, even when you're sitting there with an invisible badge pinned to your lovely breast? — J.D. Robb

When Mrs. Casnoff saw us, she walked over to us. "Sophie," she said, her voice warmer than I'd ever heard it. "Happy birthday. It's good to see you."
I actually believed he meant it, which was weird. Weirder still was the smile she gave me as she said, "I was just talking with several of the guests about your decision not to go through with the Removal. We're all so pleased."
Great. Nothing better than my superpersonal decision being party chitchat.
"Well,that's probably a first for you," I tried to joke. When she just looked confused, I clarified. "Being pleased with me."
And then she completely freaked me out by laughing. Granted, it was a low, short laugh, but still. — Rachel Hawkins

I noticed several things about the drummer all at once. He was focused on the task at hand, keeping perfect rhythm. Instead of a swirl of transparent colors around his torso, there was a small, concentrated starburst of bright red at his sternum. But otherwise his aura was blank. Huh. That was strange. But before I could contemplate it too much, my eyes landed on his face.
Wowza.
He was smokin' hot. As in H-O-T-T hot. I'd never understood until that moment why girls insisted on adding an extra T. This guy was extra-T worthy.
I examined the drummer, determined to find a flaw.
Brown hair. An interesting haircut: short around the sides and back, but longer on top, hanging loose and angling across his forehead. His eyes were narrow and his eyebrows were a bit thick and ... Oh, who was I kidding? I could pick him apart, but even the shifty slant of his eyes made him more alluring to me. — Wendy Higgins

I receive a lot of letters like yours. Most go on in length, describing all sorts of maddening situations and communications in bewildered detail, but in each there is the same question at its core: Can I convince the person about whom I am crazy to be crazy about me? The short answer is no. The long answer is no. — Cheryl Strayed

That doesn't sound fair," says Peter. "What if one person only has seven fears and someone else has twenty? That's not their fault."
Four stares at him for a few seconds and then laughs. "Do you really want to talk to me about what's fair?"
The crowd of initiates parts to make way for him as he walks toward Peter, folds his arms,and says,in a deadly voice, "I understand why you're worried, Peter.The events of last night certainly proved that you are a miserable coward."
Peter stares back,expressionless.
"So now we all know," says Four, quietly, "that you are afraid of a short, skinny girl from Abnegation." His mouth curls in a smile.
Will puts his arm around me. Christina's shoulders shake with suppressed laughter. And somewhere within me,I find a smile too. — Veronica Roth

I have been an elated reader of all the great Russian novelists and short-story writers since my early twenties and I have often written about them, though I know no Russian and have never been to Russia. The lure for me (I realize now) lay in John Bayley's wonderful phrase - I believe in his learned introduction to Pushkin's Letters - that the "doors of the Russian house are wide open": we see people who speak out in the lost hours of the day as it passes through them. — V.S. Pritchett

Americans, by which I mean people who live in the United States, are incredibly juvenile about social change. Robin Morgan called it "ejaculatory politics": if it doesn't happen right away it doesn't happen. The Women's Movement in this country has all the same characteristics as the culture that we live in, short-term gratification, personal fulfilment, personal advancement, and yes, coming out as a lesbian can get in the way of that. Liberals and left-wing men have recolonised women around the fear of the right. This troubles me - it makes me feel like we're really suckers. — Andrea Dworkin

I fall upon the thorns of life, I bleed. And then? I fall upon the thorns of life, I bleed. And what next? I get laid, I take a short holiday, but very soon after I fall upon those same thorns with gratification in pain, or suffering in joy - who knows what the mixture is! What good, what lasting good is there in me? Is there nothing else between birth and death but what I can get out of this perversity - only a favorable balance of disorderly emotions? No freedom? Only impulses? And what about all the good I have in my heart - does it mean anything? Is it simply a joke? A false hope that makes a man feel the illusion of worth? And so he goes on with his struggles. But this good is no phony. I know it isn't. I swear it. — Saul Bellow

Is that why you've been pushing me away? Because of how you look? [ ... ] I waited for you my whole life. Yearned for you my whole life. After Tersa told me you were coming, I spent seven hundred years searching for you[ ... ] I never gave a damn what you looked like
tall, short, fat, thin, plain, beautiful, ugly. Why would I care about what you looked like? The flesh was the shell that housed the glory[ ... ] Even if I couldn't be your physical lover, there are other ways to be a lover and I know them all. So don't stand there and tell me how you feel depends on how you look! — Anne Bishop

He loved me so much more than he loved himself. It broke my heart that he'd sell himself short like that. It made it impossible to hold myself back. "You're everything to me," I breathed. "I think about you all the time. — Sylvia Day

Still, to me, the bottom line wasn't about the Dark Book at all. It was about uncovering the details of my sister's secret life. I didn't want the creepy thing. I just wanted to know who or what had killed Alina, and I wanted him or it dead. Then I wanted to go home to my pleasantly provincial po-dunk little town in steamy southern Georgia and forget about everything that had happened to me while I was in Dublin. The Fae didn't visit Ashford? Good. I'd marry a local boy with a jacked-up Chevy pickup truck, Toby Keith singing "Who's Your Daddy?" on the radio, and eight proud generations of honest, hardworking Ashford ancestors decorating his family tree. Short of essential shopping trips to Atlanta, I'd never leave home again. But — Karen Marie Moning

Once again I have told you so little, and have asked no questions, and once again I must close. But not a single answer and, even more certainly, not a single question shall be lost. There exists some kind of sorcery by which two people, without seeing each other, without talking to each other, can at least discover the greater part about each other's past, literally in a flash, without having to tell each other all and everything; but this, after all, is almost an instrument of Black Magic (without seeming to be) which, although never without reward, one would certainly never resort to with impunity. Therefore I won't say it, unless you guess it first. It is terribly short, like all magic formulas. Farewell, and let me reinforce this greeting by lingering over your hand.
Yours, Franz K. — Franz Kafka

[On The Catcher in the Rye] "This Salinger, he's a short story guy. And he knows how to write about kids. This book though, it's too long. Gets kind of monotonous. And he should've cut out a lot about these jerks and all that crumby school. They depress me. - James Stern — The New York Times

When I was about 13 or 14, I had an English teacher who made a deal with me that I could get out of doing all of the year's regular work if I would write a short story a week and on Friday read it to the class. — Victor Salva

In these disturbed days in which we live, it has probably occurred to all thinking men that something drastic ought to be done about aunts. Speaking for myself, I have long felt that stones should be turned and avenues explored with a view to putting a stopper on the relatives in question. If someone were to come to me and say, 'Wooster, would you be interested in joining a society I am starting whose aim will be the suppression of aunts or at least will see to it that they are kept on a short chain and are not permitted to roam hither and thither at will, scattering desolation on all side?', I would reply, 'Wilbraham', if his name was Wilbraham, 'I am with you heart and soul. Put me down as a foundation member. — P.G. Wodehouse

John Lennon was just one of us, another human just trying to get through the day, and help make tomorrow a little better. And he was willing to put his thoughts and feelings about all that into his music, and when he had the chance to speak in interviews. He was only around for a short time, but he learned so much and was willing to give his heart and mind to all of us. What he had to say still resonates with me, with all of his fans. — Steve Landes

The raft finally got here," he said.
Calypso snorted. Her eyes might have been red, but it was hard to tell in the moonlight. "You just noticed?"
"But if it only shows up for guys you like-"
"Don't push your luck, Leo Valdez," she said. "I still hate you."
"Okay."
"And you are not coming back here," she insisted. "So don't give me any empty promises."
"How about a full promise?" he said. "Because I'm definitely-"
She grabbed his face and pulled him into a kiss, which effectively shut him up.
For all his joking and flirting, Leo had never kissed a girl before. Well, sisterly pecks on the cheeck from Piper, but that didn't count. This was a real, full-contact kiss. If Leo had had gears and wires in his brain, they would've short-circuited.
Calypso pushed him away. "That didn't happen."
"Okay." His voice sounded an octave higher than usual. — Rick Riordan

What does somebody like you want? More power? More toys? More sex?"
"All of the above. All the time."
"Greedy bugger."
"Kid, let me tell you something. Most people spend their short time in this world less than half alive. They wander through their days in a haze of responsibility and resentment. Something happens to them not long after they're born. They get conflicted about what they want and start worshipping the wrong gods. Should. Mercy. Equality. Altruism. There's nothing you should do. Do what you want. Mercy isn't Nature's way. She's an equal opportunity killer. We aren't born the same. Some are stronger, smarter, faster. Never apologize for it. Altruism is an impossible concept. There's no action you can make that doesn't spring from how you want to feel about yourself. Not greedy, Dani. Alive. And happy about it every single fucking day. — Karen Marie Moning

I just want to know...if I am special,' finished September, halfway between a whisper and a squeak. 'In stories, when someone appears in a poof of green clouds and asks a girl to go away on an adventure, it's because she's special, because she's smart and strong and can solve riddles and fight with swords and give really good speeches, and . . . I don't know that I'm any of those things. I don't even know that I'm as ill-tempered as all that. I'm not dull or anything, I know about geography and chess, and I can fix the boiler when my mother has to work. But what I mean to say is: Maybe you meant to go to another girl's house and let her ride on the Leopard. Maybe you didn't mean to choose me at all, because I'm not like storybook girls. I'm short and my father ran away with the army and I wouldn't even be able to keep a dog from eating a bird. — Catherynne M Valente

Her religious poetry was surprisingly slender, and as I was eager to know more about her religion, I asked her about this aspect of her poetry. She replied with these lines from Keats' Ode to a Grecian Urn: 'Beauty is truth, truth beauty'
that is all Ye know on eath, and all ye need to know'. Do not ask me to immortalise the great Mystery of Life. I am just a humble worker. For beauty, look to the Pslams, to Isaiah, to St. John of the Cross. How could my poor pen scan such verse? For truth, look to the Gospels
four short accounts of God made Man. There is nothing more to say. — Jennifer Worth

I still do live concerts all over the country - about four a month - with singing and characters and improv. It keeps me limber. I'll never lose that. And comedy is still the bread and butter. — Martin Short

I wish I wasn't an imperial highness or an ex-grand duchess. I'm sick of people doing things to me because of what I am. Girl-in-white-dress. Short-one-with-fringe. Daughter-of-the-tsar. Child-of-the-ex-tyrant. I want people to look and see me, Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova, not the caboose on a train of grand duchesses. Someday, I promise myself, no one will be able to hear my name or look at my picture and suppose they know all about me. Someday I will do something bigger than what I am. — Sarah Miller

It is always so strange that when you are working you never think of all the inspiring thoughts that made you take up the work in the first instance. Before I was in hospital at all I thought that because I suffered myself I should feel it a grand thing to relieve the sufferings of other people. But now, when I am actually doing something which I know relieves someone's pain, it is nothing but a matter of business. I may think lofty thoughts about the whole thing before or after but never at the time. At least, almost never. Sometimes some quite little thing makes me stop short all of a sudden and I feel a fierce desire to cry in the middle of whatever it is I am doing. — Vera Brittain

Problem is, I want to make breaking up Jo and Ryodan number one on my list, which is stupid because there's nothing but personal satisfaction I'd gain from it, and while I'm all about personal satisfaction, I'm beginning to see a pattern: jumping on the short-term-gratification train always seems to wreck me off the rails somehow. — Karen Marie Moning

Actually, writers have no business writing about their own works. They either wax conceited, saying things like: 'My brilliance is possibly most apparent in my dazzling short story, "The Cookiepants Hypotenuse."' Or else they get unbearably cutesy: 'My cat Ootsywootums has given me all my best ideas, hasn't oo, squeezums? — Connie Willis

Teddy taught me about kindness, about love that is unconditional; a sentiment not dependent on acceptance, approval, or the expectation of something in return. It was the first time I would ever feel this from a man who wasn't my grandfather. And I didn't know what to do with it at all. If only I'd embraced our differences sooner. I didn't know it then, but we had so little time left. — Padma Lakshmi

I'm not the one who kissed you in the bathroom. In case you're thinking I forgot about that, or somehow missed it, or ... "
"Kind of hard to miss," Ian agreed. "Your lips, mine. A distinct smacking sound. Yup, that was me kissing you. Still, it was short - quickly over and done. A kiss good-bye. The subtext was I hope we don't die, but if we do, it was nice meeting you. Not at all like that under-the-dock kiss." He paused. "The one where you jumped me. The first time. So far." He narrowed his eyes at her, much the way she'd done to him. "Naturally I'm suspicious. Did you intentionally leave my clothes behind? — Suzanne Brockmann

Four shrugs. "So I suggest that you take the next week to consider your fears and develop strategies to face them." "That doesn't sound fair," says Peter. "What if one person only has seven fears and someone else has twenty? That's not their fault." Four stares at him for a few seconds and then laughs. "Do you really want to talk to me about what's fair?" The crowd of initiates parts to make way for him as he walks toward Peter, folds his arms, and says, in a deadly voice, "I understand why you're worried, Peter. The events of last night certainly proved that you are a miserable coward." Peter stares back, expressionless. "So now we all know," says Four, quietly, "that you are afraid of a short, skinny girl from Abnegation." His mouth curls in a smile. — Veronica Roth

I didn't want to talk about things like that. "Listen," I said; "I haven't any money. I never have had any. I just go along, and trust to God." "Sure," he agreed; "sure. But that don't signify. What you want to ask yourself is, what does God think about it?" It brought me up short, and made me feel a little uncomfortable. "I don't know, Gus," I said. "What do you think He thinks?" The toothpick was well chewed out by now; he wrapped his legs around the rungs of his chair, and leaned back. "I wish I could tell you, Mack," he said; "I do indeed. Sometimes you'd almost think He don't know we're here at all. And then when it looks worst, you get a break; along comes a fare for Jersey City, or some drunk tips you what's left of a five dollar bill. That don't make you believe in God, but it shows which way the land lies." "The — Robert Nathan

But it's hard for me to pinpoint where all my characters and dialogue come from - imagination or real life. My memoir, of course, was all about my past, and many of the short stories cleave very closely to my life, but the more stories I wrote in the collection, the more that seemed to be invented, but who knows ... I think I'm writing about a young woman with acne who shoplifts, but I'm really writing about myself. — Said Sayrafiezadeh

Though I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers, the Fates, put me down for this shabby part of a whaling voyage, when others were set down for magnificent parts in high tragedies, and short and easy parts in genteel comedies, and jolly parts in faces - though I cannot tell why this was exactly; yet, now that I recall all the circumstances, I think I can see a little into the springs and motives which being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, induced me to set about performing the part I did, besides cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment. — Herman Melville

This notebook might be all I have left of her. My hand is still hovering over the cover, tempting me to open it and find her again, even if it's only for a short while, even if it's only on paper. But part of me is terrified. This might not end well. This might not be anything I want to see. And so help me, if this turns out to be some kind of diary concerning her thoughts and feelings about Kent, I might just throw myself out the window. — Tahereh Mafi

Good profiles mentioned characteristics that would probably be true for all of us, such as: "I want someone who will make me laugh." About Me sections with fewer than a hundred words tend to be clearly popular. Short profiles that express just enough information to pique someone's interest work best. — Amy Webb

Are you planning to go into writing as a career?'
'Yes, yes, that's what this is all about for me. I'm planning to write another short story this weekend. Have you read Hemingway by the way?'
'Oh yes. Part of growing up.'
'A bit like that, yes. Straight to the point. Simple and clear. With weight behind it. — Karl Ove Knausgard

They led me across the commissary and along a short hall into the next building. The skinhead was named Royce, and Royce liked to bitch. He and most of the other guards had arrived yesterday, and didn't like busting their asses all night to put up the plywood. He went on about it until the Syrian told him to shut up. Then he shut, and we passed more guards. Most carried shock prods and clubs, but some had short black shotguns and one had a Chinese Kalashnikov. They looked tense and anxious, and their silence and weapons made me wonder what the Syrian was expecting. The — Robert Crais

I just wasn't able to say it before now.'
He blinked. 'You needed to knee a man in the groin before you could tell me you loved me?'
'No!' Then she thought about his words. 'Well, yes, in a way. I've always been so fearful that you would run my life. But I've learned that having you with me doesn't mean that I can't take care of myself as well.'
'You certainly made short work of Eversleigh.'
Her chin lifted a notch and she allowed herself a satisfied smile. 'Yes, I did, didn't I? And do you know, but I think I couldn't have done it without you.'
'Victoria, you did this all on your own. I wasn't even present.'
'Yes, you were.' She picked up his hand and placed it over her heart. — Julia Quinn

I have heard people say that the short story was one of the most difficult literary forms, and I've always tried to decide why people feel this way about what seems to me to be one of the most natural and fundamental ways of human expression. After all, you begin to hear and tell stories when you're a child, and there doesn't seem to be anything very complicated about it. I suspect that most of you have been telling stories all your lives, and yet here you sit - come to find out how to do it.
Then last week, after I had written down some of these serene thoughts to use here today, my calm was shattered when I was sent seven of your manuscripts to read.
After this experience, I found myself ready to admit, if not that the short story is one of the most difficult literary forms, at least that it is more difficult for some than for others. — Flannery O'Connor

Already that morning missus had taken her cane stick to me once cross my backside for falling asleep during her devotions. Every day, all us slaves, everyone but Rosetta, who was old and demented, jammed in the dining room before breakfast to fight off sleep while missus taught us short Bible verses like "Jesus wept" and prayed out loud about God's favorite subject, obedience. If you nodded off, you got whacked right in the middle of God said this and God said that. — Sue Monk Kidd

It took me thirty-six years; and, in some fifty stories, ranging in length from short-shorts to novels, I think I must have touched, in one way or another, on every aspect of computers and computerization. And (mark this!) I did it without ever knowing anything at all about computers in any real sense. To this day, I don't. I am totally inept with machinery ... on my typewriter I turn out books at the contemptible rate of one a month — Isaac Asimov

Everything that I think that I need to do, is all in order to propel me to some place, that when I get there I think I will be happier. So, everything that I am doing, no matter what it is, all of my lists of rights and wrongs, are all about me getting to a manifestation, that I believe I will then be happier ... So why don't I just take the short cut and just be happy? — Esther Hicks

But the fantasy kingdom and trappings of success soon lost their luster, as I discovered that the most prestigious and remunerative of my resume's way stations was also the most tedious and unfulfilling I had ever experienced. This paradox only made me more morose about modernity. Why was I going to watch my hairline recede in front of two-thousand-line spreadsheets staring at me from cold, glowing monitors? Why was everyone in my office apparently so happy to be spending so many hours there, when the things they really cared about - people, pets, pastimes - were all relegated to a few photographs on their desks? That seemed to be the formula: spend the best years of your life in an office with photos of what you really care about. — Zack Love

You know, developments here remind me of the Internet. That old computer network, invented by the American scientific community. It was all about free communications. Very simple and widely distributed - there was never any central control. It spread worldwide in short order. It turned into the world's biggest piracy copy machine. The Chinese loved the Internet, they used it and turned it against us. They destroyed our information economy with it. Even then the net didn't go away - it just started breeding its virtual tribes, all these nomads and dissidents. — Bruce Sterling

I've now got myself into the kind of trouble that I have always considered to be quite a possibility for me, though I have usually rated it at about 10:1 against. I shall shortly be pleading guilty to a charge of sexual offences with a young man. The story of how it all came to be found out is a long and fascinating one, which I shall have to make into a short story one day, but haven't the time to tell you now. No doubt I shall emerge from it all a different man, but quite who I've not found out. — Alan Turing

One more nice thing about short stories is that you can create a story out of the smallest details -an idea that springs up in your mind, a word, an image, whatever. In most cases it's like jazz improvisation, with the story taking me where it wants to. And another good point is that with short stories you don't have to worry about failing. If the idea doesn't work out the way you hoped it would, you just shrug your shoulders and tell yourself that they can't all be winners. Even with masters of the genre like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Raymond Carver -even Anton Chekhov- not every short story is a masterpiece. I find this a great comfort. You can learn from your mistakes (in other words, those you can't call complete success) and use that in the next story you write. — Haruki Murakami

Charlotte Stokehurst," Violet Bridgerton announced, "is getting married."
"Today?" Hyacinth queried, taking off her gloves.
Her mother gave her a look. "She has become engaged. Her mother told me this morning."
Hyacinth looked around. "Were you waiting for me in the hall?"
"To the Earl of Renton," Violet added. "Renton."
"Have we any tea?" Hyacinth asked. "I walked all the way home, and I'm thirsty."
"Renton!" Violet exclaimed, looking about ready to throw up her hands in despair. "Did you hear me?"
"Renton," Hyacinth said obligingly. "He has fat ankles."
"He's - " Violet stopped short. "Why were you looking at his ankles? — Julia Quinn

All about us were people. Perhaps a hundred. Men. Experience had taught me that humans were cruelest when segregated by sex, and the cold feeling in the pit of my stomach became led. What had I let myself in for? — C.S. Friedman

Nose to nose with her, he gave her his best bad dog snarl. You've forgotten who and what you're dealing with here, princess. So let me jar your memory. I'm not on your father's short list of men you can bring home to dinner. I'm not a nice man. So if all you're looking for is sex ... just keep this up and you're liable to get it. And don't expect some polite little in-and-out and 'oh darling, that was lovely.' You come to my bed, I'm going to fuck you, and there won't be anything polite about it. — Cindy Gerard

I just love all women. A lot of them are women a lot of men wouldn't find attractive in the least, but they're mouth-watering to me. All different sizes: tall, short, fat. Just about the only type I'm not into is the typical fashion model. — Dave Cooper

All I really want to be is boring. When people talk about me, I'd like them to say, Carol's basically a short Bill Bradley. Or, Carol's kind of like Al Gore in a skirt. — Carol Moseley Braun

Do you know what two centimeters is?
Yeah. It's a measurement.
It's about three quarters of an inch.
All right.
That's the distance that round missed your liver by.
Is that what the doctor told you?
Yes. You know what the liver does?
No.
It keeps you alive. Do you know who the man is who shot you?
Maybe he didnt shoot me. Maybe it was one of the Mexicans.
Do you know who the man is?
No. Am I supposed to?
Becase he's not somebody you really want to know. The people he meets tend to have very short futures. Nonexistent, in fact.
Well good for him. — Cormac McCarthy

Well, let's all get maudlin, shall we? George, stop on the way and get us some red-hot pokers to put out our eyes. Oh, and while you're at it, I think we should see about adding salt for our wounds, too. (Solin)
Quite good, sir. Is there any particular place you'd care for me to stop? I've heard the market is a good place for pokers. That is, if you're agreeable to a short detour. (George)
What do you two think? Run-of-the-mill pokers, or a better quality. Oh hell, why not use rusty spoons. They'd hurt more. (Solin) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Marta Jolicoeur: We all learned how to ride from George and had wonderful riding careers but more than that, George taught us how to be successful in life...George had us all sized up. He used to tell me that I'm a worrier and he was right! I used to get rally nervous in the ring when I was about fifteen, and he made me go around the ring, reciting out loud, 'I know I'm going to see a distance. It might be a little short or a little long, but I know I'm going to see something.' I would have to say it loud over and over again on course... — George H. Morris

I've missed you, Jas. You have no idea," he continued, reaching toward me again but stopping short of touching me. "I thought about you every damn day. All I wanted was to get back to you and the clan. But mostly you. Always you. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

Van Laar wasn't a climate change denier, nor did he talk defensively of the United States' appetite for oil. Rather, he confessed, "I don't give much of a fuck, and nobody I know does, either, because this industry is giving me a future, even if it's a short one and we're all about to toast together. — Tony Horwitz

It struck me that Lee was in many ways our true hero. Lee was the one who did the dirtiest jobs, quietly, without fuss, without going into big emotional scenes. He was so efficient, so reliable, so brave. Whenever we fell short, he made up the gap. I'm not just talking about the red hot moments, when enemy soldiers were shooting at us, when we were within a moment of death. I'm talking about the sourer times too, when we were so tired we could hardly remember to breathe, or we were so bored we'd pick at each other just for something to do, or so distressed we'd wish a soldier would come along and blow us into oblivion with an M16. At all those times Lee stood strong. He was like the Wirrawee grain silo. You could see the grain silo from miles away, tall and reliable. It stood for Wirrawee, and it gave you a safe comforting feeling to know it was there. That was how I'd felt about Lee during the war. — John Marsden

EVEN THOUGH I KNEW it was going to be what she would ask me, Graciela McCaleb's request gave me pause. Terry McCaleb had died on his boat a month earlier. I had read about it in the Las Vegas Sun. It had made the papers because of the movie. FBI agent gets heart transplant and then tracks down his donor's killer. It was a story that had Hollywood written all over it and Clint Eastwood played the part, even though he had a couple decades on Terry. The film was a modest success at best, but it still gave Terry the kind of notoriety that guaranteed an obituary notice in papers across the country. I had just gotten back to my apartment near the strip one morning and picked up the Sun. Terry's death was a short story in the back of the A section. — Michael Connelly

I thought about that while he made his next calls, while I kept on with the newsletters. I thought about it during Sunday service at Word of Life, and during study hours in my room, with the Viking Erin and her squeaky pink highlighter. What it meant to really believe in something - for real. Belief. The big dictionary in the Promise library said it meant something one accepts as true or real; a firmly held conviction or opinion. But even that definition, as short and simple as it was, confused me. True or real: Those were definite words; opinion and conviction just weren't - opinions wavered and changed and fluctuated with the person, the situation. And most troubling of all was the word accepts. Something one accepts. I was much better at excepting everything than accepting anything, at least anything for certain, for definite. That much I knew. That much I believed. — Emily M. Danforth

There's an immense dramatic possibility in describing that universe. The books, for me, were an enormous relief in that sense of how they were written to allow primary emotion, elemental emotion, to matter enormously but to give the thing an extraordinary flow so you don't notice at what point that you're actually overwhelmed by this. There's no showiness, at all. It's the opposite of showiness. I think, if it was a painting, it could be very grey abstract, almost, with some lines and very, very beautiful. But you wouldn't have a notion of where the beauty was.
(Talking about the short stories of Alistair MacLeod, who he discovered while working on The Modern Library.) — Colm Toibin

Is Abelone beautiful? I asked myself, surprised. Then I left home to go to the Academy for Young Noblemen; it was the start of a distasteful and harmful period. But there at Soro whenever I separated myself from the others and they let me stand in peace at the window I would look out in amongst the trees; and in such moments and at night the certainty grew in me that Abelone was beautiful. And I started writing her all those letters, lengthy ones and short, many of them secret letters in which I thought I was writing about Ulsgaard and about my present unhappiness . But, as I see it now, they may well have been love letters. — Rainer Maria Rilke

That's the key, you know, confidence. I know for a fact that if you genuinely like your body, so can others. It doesn't really matter if it's short, tall, fat or thin, it just matters that you can find some things to like about it. Even if that means having a good laugh at the bits of it that wobble independently, occasionally, that's all right. It might take you a while to believe me on this one, lots of people don't because they seem to suffer from self-hatred that precludes them from imagining that a big woman could ever love herself because they don't. But I do. I know what I've got is a bit strange and difficult to love but those are the very aspects that I love the most! It's a bit like people. I've never been particularly attracted to the uniform of conventional beauty. I'm always a bit suspicious of people who feel compelled to conform. I personally like the adventure of difference. And what's beauty, anyway? — Dawn French

Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of school the year the rules were mentioned. All I know about grammar is its infinite power. To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence, as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning of the object photographed. Many people know about camera angles now, but not so many know about sentences. The arrangement of the words matters, and the arrangement you want can be found in the picture in your mind. The picture dictates the arrangement. The picture dictates whether this will be a sentence with or without clauses, a sentence that ends hard or a dying-fall sentence, long or short, active or passive. The picture tells you how to arrange the words and the arrangement of the words tells you, or tells me, what's going on in the picture. Nota bene.
It tells you.
You don't tell it. — Joan Didion

The other guy is obviously meant for me. He's quite short. I don't care about that. I'm quite short myself. I prefer beta males to alphas. Only he keeps telling me to smile. "Nothing's as bad as all that," he says. If I were five years old, I'd have bitten him by now. — Karen Joy Fowler

We part, then, for the nonce, do we?'
'I fear so, sir.'
'You take the high road, and self taking the low road, as it were?'
'Yes, sir.'
'I shall miss you, Jeeves.'
'Thank you, sir.'
'Who was that chap who was always beefing about gazelles?'
'The poet Moore, sir. He complained that he had never nursed a dear gazelle, to glad him with its soft black eye, but when it came to know him well, it was sure to die.'
'It's the same with me. I am a gazelle short. You don't mind me alluding to you as a gazelle, Jeeves?'
'Not at all, sir. — P.G. Wodehouse

Here is an entry from June 12, 1989, three and a half years after my father's death: I feel so helpless sometimes. I know that my destiny is in my own hands, but to what extent? There is so much to think about - family, friends, career, LIFE! Will my grandchildren read this, years from now, and see it as the only thing to remember me by? No legacy? We're here for such a short time. But what exactly are my ambitions? I thought ambition was viewed as bad, as wrong. It turns out it's the key to everything. Where will I be in ten years? I want to be successful. What do I believe in - really believe in? Hell, Megyn, what do you even know about the world? I want to know what my teachers know. Where is it all? In books? I know where it is - it's in years and years of research and experiences. That's not something I can just have. I have to get it all for myself. I'm just sitting here wondering who I really am inside and - who am I to become? — Megyn Kelly

Wee, wee, wee, wee, all the way home," Hazlit quoted the nursery rhyme. Portmaine paused before sipping his own drink. "Did Maggie Windham strike you on the head?" "No. She hired me, and it took me half my walk home to figure out what she's truly about." "She wants to have her way with your tender young flesh," Portmaine suggested. "You're overdue to get your wick dipped, you know." "Your concern is touching, Archer." "You always get short-tempered when you've neglected your romping. Maybe you should go a round or two with Lady Norcross." "Maybe I should find a partner who can think beyond his next swiving." "I like swiving." Portmaine pushed off the desk and refilled his drink, then came to rest on the sofa a couple of feet from Hazlit. "It's normal to like swiving. Lady Norcross apparently understands this. You used to understand this. I certainly understand it. More brandy?" "You're outpacing me," Hazlit said, smiling slightly at Portmaine's predictable simplicity. "And — Grace Burrowes

First of all, God inspires me, where he's brought me, it blows my mind. To know that He brought me this far, it could not have been an accident, to go forward, I'm excited to leap into the void, I'm excited about tomorrow, the unknown, excited to see what else He has for me. — Columbus Short

The leaves on our little maple, all taken together, weigh thirty-five pounds. Every ounce therein must be pulled from the air or mined from the soil - and quickly - over the course of a few short months. From the atmosphere, a plant gains carbon dioxide, which it will make into sugar and pith. Thirty-five pounds of maple leaves may not taste sweet to you and me, but they actually contain enough sucrose to make three pecan pies, which is the sweetest thing that I can think of right now. The pithy skeleton within the leaves contains enough cellulose to make almost three hundred sheets of paper, which is about the number that I used to print out the manuscript for this book. Our — Hope Jahren

And what nags me about this is that the source of my anxiety was exactly what Kierkegaard says the source of anxiety is, and what he praised in direct proportion to the volume any person possesses: possibility. The awareness that life is a series of choices any one of which could be either aggrandizing or disastrous. That this happens to be true I have no trouble signing on to. Any who has lived past the age of ten knows that even piddling actions can wind up having big consequences, and that even when you are super-conscious of your behaviors you can't know how things are going to turn out in the short- or the long-run. That's the drama of it all. On the one hand, your very existence means you can and will change things in your life and others. On the other hand, you aren't God, so everything is always going to be drenched in uncertainty and doubt. — Daniel Smith

Around 1980, I'd been writing short stories, all to no success; so I wrote a fan letter to Stephen King and asked "How long should it take an aspiring writer to either get published or know when to give up?" Lo and behold, King wrote back to me in long hand with blue flair pen on 14-inch paper, purveying a very nice, helpful note; in it he said my letter proved a "command of the language," that I should never give up, and that it would take years to succeed, not months. "That's cold comfort but it's the truth." This was the ultimate encouragement for a young writer to be who didn't know shit about the market. I took Mr. King's advice and actually sold my first novel little more than a year later. I'll always be copiously grateful for this advice, and it's the same advice I give aspiring writers now (along with the story of King's reply!). — Edward Lee