
“A man will turn over half a library to make one book.”
April 6, 1775
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol II
April 6, 1775
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol II
Source: The Life of Samuel Johnson LL.D. Vol 2
“A man will turn over half a library to make one book.”
April 6, 1775
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol II
Source: Persecution and the Art of Writing (1952), How to Study Spinoza's Theologico-Political Treatise, p. 144
Essay: "An Introvert Steps Out," "Sunday Book Review" section of The New York Times, online April 27, 2012 and in print April 29, 2012.
"Introduction" http://www.bopsecrets.org/rexroth/autobio/1.htm
An Autobiographical Novel (1991)
Context: Any writer, reading over the typescript of a book for the last time before sending it off to the publisher, must wonder what all the effort was for. An autobiography is specially in need of justification to its author. It is a work of self-justification which itself needs justifying. Why have I written this book? Why have I written it the way I have? What does it mean to me? What do I hope it will mean to others?
Each human being has at the final core of self a crystal from which the whole manifold of the personality develops, a secret molecular lattice which governs the unfolding of all the structures of the individuality, in time, in space, in memory, in action and contemplation. Asleep there were just these dreams and no others. Awake there were these actions only. Only these deeds came into being.
“She thought a writer should work harder writing a book than she did reading it.”
Source: The Marriage Plot