No one ever found wisdom without also being a fool. Writers, alas, have to be fools in public, while the rest of the human race can cover its tracks.
ERICA JONGIf you don’t have time to do it right you must have time to do it right you must have time to do it over. If you don’t know where you are going, how do you know when you get there? If you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.
More Erica Jong Quotes
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How wonderful to have someone to blame! How wonderful to live with one’s nemesis! You may be miserable, but you feel forever in the right.
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The words carry their own momentum. A confession in motion tends to stay in motion. Newton’s first law of jealousy.
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The truth is simple, you do not die from love. You only wish you did.
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As long as I’m facing the right direction, it doesn’t matter the size of my steps.
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Compose with utter freedom and edit with utter discipline.
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Divorce is my generation’s coming of age ceremony – a ritual scarring that makes anything that happens afterward seem bearable.
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Home is where your books are.
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Life is full of excuses to feel pain, excuses not to live, excuses, excuses, excuses.
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The parity of women’s health. It’s very depressing to think that you win these rights, but then you have to win them again, and again, and again, and fight the same battles over and over.
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I have accepted fear as a part of life – specifically the fear of change… I have gone ahead despite the pounding in the heart that says: turn back.
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It is the nature of those books we call classics to wait patiently on the shelf for us to grow into them.
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In a world where women work three times as hard for half as much, our achievement has been denigrated, both marriage and divorce have turned against us, our motherhood has been used as an obstacle to our success, our passion as a trap.
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My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you’ll be happy; if not, you’ll become a philosopher.” – Socrates (470-399 B.C.) “Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t
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In loving life you love what can’t survive.
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Shakespeare wrote without knowing he would become Shakespeare
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People are interested in their own sexuality and they’ve always reflected it in their art. End of story.
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I do believe that in every age there are people whose consciousness transcends their own time and that these people, whether fictional or historical, are those with whom we most closely identify and those about whom we most enjoy reading.
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Betrayal betrays the betrayer.
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Creativity demands nothing less than all you have. Talent alone is never enough.
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You see a lot of smart guys with dumb women, but you hardly ever see a smart woman with a dumb guy.
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There’s always a backlash against progressive ideas.
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It’s easier to write about pain than about joy. Joy is wordless.
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I believe that women should live for love, for motherhood and for intellect, and I believe we shouldn’t have to choose. And I believe that’s always been difficult for women, to express themselves intellectually, maternally, and passionately.
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It’s horrible getting older. I mean, it’s wonderful because you see the circles of life get completed. But it’s horrible losing your looks.
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Women are their own worst enemies. And guilt is the main weapon of self-torture . . . Show me a woman who doesn’t feel guilty and I’ll show you a man.
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Breast-feeding may succumb to the bottle; cuddling, fondling, and paediatric visits may also be done by fathers…but when a child needs a mother to talk to, nobody else but a mother will do.
ERICA JONG