E. B. White quotes - page 4

Life is like writing with a pen. You can cross out your past but you can't erase it. (E. B. White)
Anyone who writes down to children is simply wasting his time. You have to write up, not down. Children are demanding. They are the most attentive, curious, eager, observant, sensitive, quick, and generally congenial readers on earth.... Children are game for anything. I throw them hard words and they backhand them across the net. View quote
E. B. White
Books are good company, in sad times and happy times, for books are people-- people who have managed to stay alive by hiding between the covers of a book. View quote
E. B. White
A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word to paper. View quote
E. B. White
I am pessimistic about the human race because it is too ingenious for its own good. Our approach to nature is to beat it into submission. We would stand a better chance of survival if we accommodated ourselves to this planet and viewed it appreciatively instead of skeptically and dictatorially. View quote
E. B. White
I admire anybody who has the guts to write anything at all. View quote
E. B. White
All that I hope to say in books, all that I ever hope to say, is that I love the world. View quote
E. B. White
A poet dares be just so clear and no clearer... He unzips the veil from beauty, but does not remove it. A poet utterly clear is a trifle glaring. View quote
E. B. White
Before the seed there comes the thought of bloom. View quote
E. B. White
The best writing is rewriting. View quote
E. B. White
Never hurry and never worry! (E. B. White)
People are, if anything, more touchy about being thought silly than they are about being thought unjust. View quote
E. B. White
Only a person who is congenially self-centered has the effrontery and the stamina to write essays. View quote
E. B. White
A poet's pleasure is to withhold a little of his meaning, to intensify by mystification. He unzips the veil from beauty, but does not remove it. View quote
E. B. White
I am reminded of the advice of my neighbor. Never worry about your heart till it stops beating. View quote
E. B. White
Early summer days are a jubilee time for birds. In the fields, around the house, in the barn, in the woods, in the swamp - everywhere love and songs and nests and eggs. View quote
E. B. White
A candidate could easily commit political suicide if he were to come up with an unconventional thought during a presidential tour. View quote
E. B. White
Geese are friends to no one, they bad mouth everybody and everything. But they are companionable once you get used to their ingratitude and false accusations. View quote
E. B. White
The young writer should learn to spot them: words that at first glance seem freighted with delicious meaning, but that soon burst in the air, leaving nothing but a memory of bright sound. View quote
E. B. White
Life is always rich and steady time when you are waiting for something to happen or to hatch. View quote
E. B. White
It is deeply satisfying to win a prize in front of a lot of people. (E. B. White)
You have been my friends. That in itself is a tremendous thing. View quote
E. B. White
I have yet to see a piece of writing, political or non-political, that does not have a slant. All writing slants the way a writer leans, and no man is born perpendicular. View quote
E. B. White
Americans are willing to go to enormous trouble and expense defending their principles with arms, very little trouble and expense advocating them with words. Temperamentally we are ready to die for certain principles (or, in the case of overripe adults, send youngsters to die), but we show little inclination to advertise the reasons for dying. View quote
E. B. White
The first day of spring was once the time for taking the young virgins into the fields, there in dalliance to set an example in fertility for nature to follow. Now we just set the clocks an hour ahead and change the oil in the crankcase. View quote
E. B. White