I enjoy writing, sometimes; I think that most writers will tell you about the agony of writing more than the joy of writing, but writing is what I was meant to do.

Often we have no time for our friends but all the time in the world for our enemies.

I enjoy writing, sometimes; I think that most writers will tell you about the agony of writing more than the joy of writing, but writing is what I was meant to do.

I essentially write for myself.

It is extremely important to know what you don't want to find.

Writing, basically breaks down to relationships between people and that is what you write about.

Usually a good part of the people trying it end up not making it.

I have been writing for 50 years and readers still read my first book from when I was in the Marine Corps.

I was a terrible English student.

I am very proud of this work because it is more about the meaning of the Easter Rising and its relationship to what this whole century has been about, people liberating themselves, freeing themselves.

I have drawn inspiration from the Marine Corps, the Jewish struggle in Palestine and Israel, and the Irish.

I do not write for an audience.

So writing is a very, very difficult position to obtain... and retain.

I was too heavy to be a jockey and too honest to be a producer, so I became a writer.

Research to me is as important or more important than the writing. It is the foundation upon which the book is built.

You can try to reach an audience, but you just write what comes out of you and you just hope that it is accepted. You do not write specifically to a generation.

My first book was rejected nine times. It turned out to be a best seller, Battle Cry? in 1953.

English of course is your major tool, but it is not nearly so important as other aspects of writing for example you have to have some natural ability you can't buy it no one puts it there you're born with it.

The ability of a person to atone has always been the most remarkable of human features.

I was tough. I used everything to my advantage. I could be very ruthless.

With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, we see into the life of things.

Sure, I get the blues. But what I try to do, is apply joy to the blues, you know? I don't know if it's a technique, or just being bent that way, being raised by the folks I was raised by.

Great joy, especially after a sudden change of circumstances, is apt to be silent, and dwells rather in the heart than on the tongue.

Color is my day-long obsession, joy and torment.

To the scientist there is the joy in pursuing truth which nearly counteracts the depressing revelations of truth.

A leaf fluttered in through the window this morning, as if supported by the rays of the sun, a bird settled on the fire escape, joy in the task of coffee, joy accompanied me as I walked.

In times of joy, all of us wished we possessed a tail we could wag.

I do not mind having written the song at all. I just wish that I had written it in a different key, as the high d is hard to play. I am glad that I wrote something that brought joy to millions of people.

The trouble with many men is that they have got just enough religion to make them miserable. If there is not joy in religion, you have got a leak in your religion.

As selfishness and complaint pervert the mind, so love with its joy clears and sharpens the vision.

This joy of discovery is real, and it is one of our rewards. So too is the approval of our work by our peers.

Let there be more joy and laughter in your living.

Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another.

And the goal really is to make the audience laugh, to bring them some joy.

Off with you! You're a happy fellow, for you'll give happiness and joy to many other people. There is nothing better or greater than that!

Who promised you that only for joy were you brought to this earth?

It's the sense of what family is at the dinner table. It was the joy of knowing mother was in the kitchen making our favorite dish. I wish more people would do this and recall the joy of life.

Irony is the gaiety of reflection and the joy of wisdom.

Health is the greatest possession. Contentment is the greatest treasure. Confidence is the greatest friend. Non-being is the greatest joy.

When I'm on stage, I'm trying to do one thing: bring people joy. Just like church does. People don't go to church to find trouble, they go there to lose it.

You all know that I have been sustained throughout my life by three saving graces - my family, my friends, and a faith in the power of resilience and hope. These graces have carried me through difficult times and they have brought more joy to the good times than I ever could have imagined.

The marvelous richness of human experience would lose something of rewarding joy if there were no limitations to overcome. The hilltop hour would not be half so wonderful if there were no dark valleys to traverse.

We never taste a perfect joy; our happiest successes are mixed with sadness.

There are a lot of other things in this world that can and will bring me joy. Acting is one of them.

Instead of asking 'How much damage will the work in question bring about?' why not ask 'How much good? How much joy?'

Love begets love. This torment is my joy.

There may be Peace without Joy, and Joy without Peace, but the two combined make Happiness.

Conquering any difficulty always gives one a secret joy, for it means pushing back a boundary-line and adding to one's liberty.

The striking thing about the Precious Blood is the bond it establishes between love and suffering in our experience, a bond that has become so close that we have come to think of suffering accepted with joy as the most authentic sign of love with any depth at all.