Famous Quotes by Annie Dillard

  • Cruelty is a mystery, and the waste of pain. But if we describe a word to compass these things, a... More
  • No; we have been as usual asking the wrong question. It does not matter a hoot what the... More
  • Our life is a faint tracing on the surface of mystery, like the idle, curved tunnels of leaf... More
  • When I was quite young I fondly imagined that all foreign languages were codes for English. I... More
  • It is the fixed that horrifies us, the fixed that assails us with the tremendous force of... More
  • It is ironic that the one thing that all religions recognize as separating us from our... More
  • The point of the dragonfly’s terrible lip, the giant water bug, birdsong, or the beautiful... More
  • In general the newly sighted see the world as a dazzle of color-patches. They are pleased by the... More
  • I don’t know what it is about fecundity that so appalls. I suppose it is the teeming evidence... More
  • The creeks ... are an active mystery, fresh every minute. Theirs is the mystery of continuous... More
  • The writer studies literature, not the world. ...He is careful of what he reads, for that is what... More
  • Write about winter in the summer. Describe Norway as Ibsen did, from a desk in Italy; describe... More
  • Your work is to keep cranking the flywheel that turns the gears that spin the belt in the engine... More
  • People love pretty much the same things best. A writer looking for subject inquires not after... More
  • I do not so much write a book as sit up with it, as with a dying friend. More
  • Appealing workplaces are to be avoided. One wants a room with no view, so imagination can meet... More
  • Aim for the chopping block. If you aim for the wood, you will have nothing. Aim past the wood,... More
  • How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that... More
  • The painter ... does not fit the paints to the world. He most certainly does not fit the world to... More
  • One of the few things I know about writing is this: spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it,... More
  • A work in progress quickly becomes feral. It reverts to a wild state overnight. It is barely... More
  • Writing a book is like rearing children—willpower has very little to do with it. If you have a... More

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