James A. Michener Quotes

Quotes about:

• The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he's always doing both.

  James A. Michener

  Love, Inspirational, Inspiring

  66 Copy quote

• Don't put off for tomorrow what you can do today because if you enjoy it today, you can do it again tomorrow.

  James A. Michener

  Procrastination, Opportunity, Today

  James A. Michener (2014). “The Drifters: A Novel”, p.528, Dial Press

  64 Copy quote

• Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth tries.

  James A. Michener

  Inspirational, Motivational, Success

  James A. Michener (2007). “Chesapeake”, p.278, Ballantine Books

  75 Copy quote

• An age is called Dark not because the light fails to shine, but because people refuse to see it.

  James A. Michener

  War, Failure, Ignorance

  James A. Michener “SPACE”

  37 Copy quote

• If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay home.

  James A. Michener

  Inspirational, Funny, Travel

  "Good Advice". Book by William Safire and Leonard Safir, 1982.

  38 Copy quote

• A poet sees things in two ways: First, as a child who never saw it before, and Second, as a dying man who will never see it again.

  James A. Michener

  Children, Men, Two

  16 Copy quote

• I was born to a woman I never knew and raised by another who took in orphans. I do not know my background, my lineage, my biological or cultural heritage. But when I meet someone new, I treat them with respect.... For after all, they could be my people.

  James A. Michener

  People, Adoption, Heritage

  41 Copy quote

• We are never prepared for what we expect.

  James A. Michener

  Preparation, Hmmm, Prepared

  James A. Michener (2014). “Caravans: A Novel of Afghanistan”, p.61, Dial Press

  21 Copy quote

• There are no insoluble problems. Only time-consuming ones.

  James A. Michener

  Problem, Consuming, Time Consuming

  James A. Michener (2014). “Space: A Novel”, p.258, Dial Press

  12 Copy quote

• If your book doesn't keep you up nights when you are writing it, it won't keep anyone up nights reading it.

  James A. Michener

  Book, Reading, Writing

  36 Copy quote

• I'm not a very good writer, but I'm an excellent rewriter.

  James A. Michener

  Writing, Crafts, Excellent

  40 Copy quote

• If a man happens to find himself, he has a mansion which he can inhabit with dignity all the days of his life.

  James A. Michener

  Self Esteem, Men, Discovery

  22 Copy quote

• The permanent temptation of life is to confuse dreams with reality. The permanent defeat of life comes when dreams are surrendered to reality.

  James A. Michener

  Life, Dream, Reality

  James A. Michener (2014). “The Drifters: A Novel”, p.59, Dial Press

  34 Copy quote

• Scientists dream about doing great things. Engineers do them.

  James A. Michener

  Dream, Science, Technology

  James A. Michener (2014). “Space: A Novel”, p.537, Dial Press

  54 Copy quote

• A nation becomes what its young people read in their youth. Its ideals are fashioned then, its goals strongly determined.

  James A. Michener

  People, Goal, Determined

  26 Copy quote

• It heartens me to think of Verdi who composed thundering operas in his eighties; Michelangelo who did fine work in his ninetieth year, and Titian, who painted better than ever in his one hundredth.

  James A. Michener

  Work, Thinking, Years

  9 Copy quote

• The dead are dead but they rely on us to fulfill their hopes.

  James A. Michener

  Rely

  James A. Michener (2013). “The Source: A Novel”, p.1276, Dial Press

  7 Copy quote

• For this is the journey that men and women make, to find themselves. If they fail in this, it doesn't matter much else what they find.

  James A. Michener

  Journey, Men, Matter

  5 Copy quote

• I write at eighty-five for the same reasons that impelled me to write at forty-five; I was born with a passionate desire to communicate, to organize experience, to tell tales that dramatize the adventures which readers might have had. I have been that ancient man who sat by the campfire at night and regaled the hunters with imaginative recitations about their prowess. The job of an apple tree is to bear apples. The job of a storyteller is to tell stories, and I have concentrated on that obligation.

  James A. Michener

  Jobs, Writing, Adventure

  James A. Michener (2014). “The World Is My Home: A Memoir”, p.17, Dial Press

  10 Copy quote

• Creative geniuses are a slap-happy lot. Treat Them with respect.

  James A. Michener

  Creativity, Science, Creative

  James A. Michener (2014). “The Novel”, p.65, Dial Press

  7 Copy quote

• I think young people ought to seek the experience that is going to knock them off center.

  James A. Michener

  Thinking, People, Young

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• I've spent my life trying to be better than I was, and I am a brother to all who share the same aspiration.

  James A. Michener

  Brother, Trying, Share

  6 Copy quote

• In six pages, I can't even say "Hello.

  James A. Michener

  Writing, Pages, Six

  Ernest Hemingway, James A. Michener (1986). “The dangerous summer”, Scribner Book Company

  5 Copy quote

• The sense of belonging is one of the great gifts men get in battle.

  James A. Michener

  Men, Battle, Great Gifts

  8 Copy quote

• You have to be eligible for luck to strike, and I think that's a matter of education and preparation, and character and all the other solid attributes that sometimes people laugh at.

  James A. Michener

  Character, Thinking, People

  27 Copy quote

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