"A ratio of failures is built into the process of writing. The wastebasket has evolved for a reason." 

--Margaret Atwood

"Once writing has become your major vice and greatest pleasure only death can stop it."

--Ernest Hemingway

"To write one's life is to live it twice and the second living is both spiritual and historical."

--Patricia Hampl 

"Those of us who had a perfectly happy childhood should be able to sue for deprivation of literary royalties."

--Chris Patten