“I wanted to do the comic strip. I tried to get it syndicated, and I sent some examples to a syndication company, and they sent me a rejection letter! I wasn't smart enough at the time to realize you shouldn't let rejection letters stop you. I thought that rejection letter meant I was not allowed to be a cartoonist in this world, so I put the rejection letter down and said, well, I'll be a stand-up comedian.” WorldWellsSaidEnoughWantedRealizingCompanyExampleThis WorldSmartLettersDown AndComicComedianRejectionCartoonistComic StripsStand Up ComedianRejection Letters Author:Brian Regan
“It is a truism of epistolary psychology that, for example, a Christmas thank-you note written on December 26 can say any old thing, but if you wait until February, you are convinced that nothing less than Middlemarch will do.” IfsWaitingPsychologyWrittenExampleLettersNotesConvincedDecemberFebruaryOld ThingsPunctualityTruismMiddlemarchThank You Note Author:Anne Fadiman
“Cliche refers to words, commonplace to ideas. Cliche describes the form or the letter, commonplace the substance or spirit. To confuse them is to confuse the thought with the expression of the thought. The cliche is immediately perceivable; the commonplace very often escapes notice if decked out in original dress. There are few examples, in any literature, of new ideas expressed in original form. The most critical mind must often be content with one or the other of these pleasures, only too happy when it is not deprived of both at once, which is not too rarely the case.” IfsMindIdeasFormSpiritLiteraturePleasureCasesExampleExpressionLettersOriginalsDressesCriticalSubstanceNew IdeasDeprivedClicheCommonplaceOften Is Author:Remy de Gourmont
“I remember that the single most vicious letter I ever read was the letter Hemingway wrote Scribners when they asked him to give a blurb for From Here to Eternity. It's there, in the Selected Letters for all to read, an example of a once great writer at his very worst. I doubt that he ever forgave Scribners for publishing James Jones in the first place. War, as Hemingway saw it, belonged to him.” GivingFirstsWarRememberDoubtSawsWorstExampleLettersEternityPublishingViciousSelectedGreat Writers Author:Larry McMurtry
“I've come to realize that making it your life's work to be different than your parents is not only hard to do, it's a dumb idea. Not everything we found fault with was necessarily wrong; we were right, for example, to resent, as kids, being told when to go to bed. We'd be equally wrong, as parents, to let our kids stay up all night. To throw out all the tools of parenting just because our parents used them would be like making yourself speak English without using ten letters of the alphabet; it's hard to do.” IdeasDifferentHardWould BeKidsUsedNightFoundSpeakParentRealizingExampleBedTenToolsLettersFaultsDumbAll NightResentAlphabetSpeak EnglishUp All NightLetters Of The Alphabet Author:Paul Reiser
“Math-thinking, I would say, encourages flipping and substituting letters in words (in the novel, one of the boys double-majors in math and myth, for example, and his twin cracks a joke about the father's handwriting that morphs "cacography" into "dadography").” ThinkingFatherBoysNovelExampleMajorsJokesLettersMathMythCracksTwinsHandwriting Author:Mary Kay Zuravleff
“The forward step must be made in silence. We detach ourselves from word forms - this can be accomplished by substituting for words, letters, concepts, verbal concepts, other modes of expressions: for example, color.” MadeFormSilenceStepsExampleColorExpressionConceptsLettersAccomplished Author:William S. Burroughs
“It's like the query letter problem that I just mentioned, magnified a hundredfold. You might be good at telling a story, but that doesn't mean you know anything about marketing. Or layout. Or editing. Or publicity. Or selling your books for foreign markets.Everyone can point to a few examples of people that have done very well for themselves self-publishing. But honestly, those folks are lucky as lottery winners.” PeopleKnowsWellsMeanBookSelfDoneStoriesProblemMightExampleLuckyLettersMarketingFolksBe GoodHonestlySellingWinnerPublishingEditingPublicityLotteryLayoutQueries Author:Patrick Rothfuss
“Reading their letters and the First Amendment of the US Constitution, I infer that this nation's founders noted that religions have been at the center of great deal of trouble, so they precluded the US government from getting involved in religion, i.e. "... shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." Over the centuries, various religions have laid claim to various morals; consider the difficulties outsiders are having today in the Middle East, for example.” FirstsHas BeensGovernmentTodayLawReadingNationsDealsMoralTroubleMiddleCenturyExampleInvolvedExerciseLettersConstitutionClaimsDifficultyVariousEastEstablishmentMiddle EastAmendmentsOutsidersFoundersFirst AmendmentUs Constitution Author:Bill Nye