Understanding humor is like dissecting a live frog. It can be done, but the frog tends to die in the process.
E. B. WHITEUse the smallest word that does the job.
More E. B. White Quotes
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Stuart rose from the ditch, climbed into his car, and started up the road that led toward the north…As he peeked ahead into the great land that stretched before him, the way seemed long. But the sky was bright, and he somehow felt he was headed in the right direction.
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Children are game for anything. I throw them hard words, and they backhand them over the net. They love words that give them a hard time, provided they are in a context that absorbs their attention.
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The main thing I try to do is write as clearly as I can. I rewrite a good deal to make it clear.
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Make the work interesting and the discipline will take care of itself.
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Habitually creative people are prepared to be lucky.
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No one can write decently who is distrustful of the reader’s intelligence or whose attitude is patronizing.
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A poem compresses much in a small space and adds music, thus heightening its meaning.
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Why did you do all this for me?’ he asked. ‘I don’t deserve it. I’ve never done anything for you.’ ‘You have been my friend,’ replied Charlotte. ‘That in itself is a tremendous thing.
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In every queen there’s a touch of floozy.
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One of the most time-consuming things is to have an enemy.
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The whole duty of a writer is to please and satisfy himself, and the true writer always plays to an audience of one.
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By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone’s life can stand a little of that.
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Writing is hard work and bad for the health.
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It can destroy an individual, or it can fulfill him, depending a good deal on luck.
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The rat had no morals, no conscience, no scruples, no consideration, no decency, no milk of rodent kindness, no compunctions, no higher feeling, no friendliness, no anything
E. B. WHITE