“Writers complete their works, whether those be thousands of pages long or just a few laconic lines.”
Liquidation (2003)
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Imre Kertész61
Hungarian writer 1929–2016Related quotes
“You're far from this. This story is just another few hundred pages of your mind.”
Markus Zusak (1975) Australian author
Source: I Am the Messenger
“How long
Do works endure? As long
As they are not completed.”
Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) German poet, playwright, theatre director
Wie lange
Dauern die Werke? So lange
Als bis sie fertig sind.
"About the way to construct enduring works" [Über die Bauart langdauernder Werke] (1932), trans. Frank Jones in Poems, 1913-1956, p. 193
Poems, 1913-1956 (1976)
Miyamoto Musashi (1584–1645) Japanese martial artist, writer, artist
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Ground Book
Context: To master the virtue of the long sword is to govern the world and oneself, thus the long sword is the basis of strategy. The principle is "strategy by means of the long sword". If he attains the virtue of the long sword, one man can beat ten men. Just as one man can beat ten, so a hundred men can beat a thousand, and a thousand men can beat ten thousand. In my strategy, one man is the same as ten thousand, so this strategy is the complete warrior's craft.
The Way of the warrior does not include other Ways, such as Confucianism, Buddhism, certain traditions, artistic accomplishments and dancing. But even though these are not part of the Way, if you know the Way broadly you will see it in everything. Men must polish their particular Way.
Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, and a key figure in Spanish language literature
Preface; Variant translations:
It is a laborious madness and an impoverishing one, the madness of composing vast books — setting out in five hundred pages an idea that can be perfectly related orally in five minutes. The better way to go about it is to pretend that those books already exist, and offer a summary, a commentary on them... A more reasonable, more inept, and more lazy man, I have chosen to write notes on imaginary books.
The composition of vast books is a laborious and impoverishing extravagance. To go on for five hundred pages developing an idea whose perfect oral exposition is possible in a few minutes! A better course of procedure is to pretend that these books already exist, and then to offer a resume, a commentary . . . More reasonable, more inept, more indolent, I have preferred to write notes upon imaginary books.
The Garden of Forking Paths (1942)
Georges Cuvier (1769–1832) French naturalist, zoologist and paleontologist (1769–1832)
about the writings of Joseph Banks. as stated in "Cavendish: The Experimental Life" on page 461, by Christa Jungnickel and Russell McCormmach, published in 1999.
Gena Showalter (1975) American writer
Source: The Darkest Kiss
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) Canadian literary critic and literary theorist
The Educated Imagination (1963), Talk 3: Giants in Time