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We don’t build,’ I said to my son, ‘we just destroy.

Bernard Cornwell

Research is a lifelong occupation so it’s hard to factor it in, but I reckon most books take 5 months from start to finish.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Book Finish Months Research
The bards sing of love, they celebrate slaughter, they extol kings and flatter queens, but were I a poet I would write in praise of friendship.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Friendship Kings Queens Writing
Writing is a solitary occupation.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Occupation Solitary Writing
Life is a jest of the Gods and there is no justice. You must learn to laugh… or else you’ll weep yourself to death.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Death Jest Justice Laughing Life
But when you have order, you don’t need Gods. When everything is well ordered and disciplined then nothing is unexpected.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Dark Order Powerful
I do understand that you can look into someone’s eyes,” I heard myself saying, “and suddenly know that life will be impossible without them.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Eye Heard Heart Impossible Voice
I’ll happily mentor anyone who wants mentoring, and most of that goes on by internet rather than face to face.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Mentor Mentoring Want
Because there could not be peace, not while two tribes shared one land. One tribe must win. Even the nailed god cannot change that truth. And I was a warrior, and in a world at war the warrior must be cruel.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Change Land Tribe War Winning
I know nothing about producing TV drama and any involvement on my part is liable to prove an obstacle to the producers, so I prefer to be a cheerleader and let them get on with it.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Cheerleader Drama Obstacle Procedure
Then you start another book and suddenly the galley proofs of the last one come in and you have to wrench your attention away from what you’re writing and try to remember what you were thinking when you wrote the previous one.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Attention Book Proof Thinking Writing
This is our land, mixed with our blood, strengthened with our bone. Ours!
BERNARD CORNWELL

Blood Bone Land Our Strengthened
If you understand everything,’ I said carefully, ‘then there’s no room left for magic. It’s only when you’re lost and frightened and in the dark that you call on the Gods, and they like us to call on them. It makes them feel powerful, and that’s why they like us to live in chaos.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Carefully Frightened God Lost Magic Room Understand
We discover that it is all an illusion and nothing is there. Lust is a voyage to nowhere, to an empty land, but some men just love such voyages and never care about the destination. Love is a voyage too, a voyage with no destination except death, but a voyage of bliss.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Destination Love Lust Men Such Voyage
So far it’s 43 books in 25 years.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Book Far Years
I sometimes wonder what would have happened if the first book had not sold… doesn’t bear thinking about, but I suppose we’d have made it work somehow.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Book Firsts Sold Suppose Thinking
What I mean by that is that the point of life, as I see it, is not to write books or scale mountains or sail oceans, but to achieve happiness, and preferably an unselfish happiness.
BERNARD CORNWELL

Achieve Funny Inspirational Ocean

We don’t build,’ I said to my son, ‘we just destroy.

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We don’t build,’ I said to my son, ‘we just destroy.

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