Quotes from book
Promise at Dawn

Name: Promise at Dawn
Author: Romain Gary

Romain Gary Original title La promesse de l'aube (French, 1960)

Promise at Dawn is a 1960 autobiographical novel by the French writer Romain Gary. Two films based on the novel, and sharing the same title, have been released: one in 1970 directed by Jules Dassin and another in 2017 directed by Eric Barbier.

“I sat day after day in my little room, waiting for inspiration to visit me, trying to invent a pseudonym that would express, in a combination of noble and striking sounds, our dream of artistic achievement, a pen name grand enough to compensate for my own feeling of insecurity and helplessness at the idea of everything my mother expected from me.”

Romain Gary book Promise at Dawn

Promise at Dawn (1960) as quoted in "Great Pretenders" by Emma Garman in Tablet (31 October 2007) http://www.tabletmag.com/arts-and-culture/books/906/great-pretenders/