P. D. James Quotes

Quotes about:

• I don't think writers choose the genre, the genre chooses us. I wrote out of the wish to create order out of disorder, the liking of a pattern.

  P. D. James

  Thinking, Order, Wish

  "PD James, Queen of Detective Fiction: Interview". Interview With Jake Kerridge, www.telegraph.co.uk. September 26, 2009.

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• I believe that political correctness can be a form of linguistic fascism, and it sends shivers down the spine of my generation who went to war against fascism.

  P. D. James

  War, Believe, Political

  FaceBook post by P.D. James from Oct 30, 2011

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• When I heard, Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, I thought, Did he fall or was he pushed?

  P. D. James

  Wall, Fall, Sat

  "Crime novelist P.D. James dies at 94" by Todd Leopold, www.cnn.com. November 27, 2014.

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• What the detective story is about is not murder but the restoration of order.

  P. D. James

  Order, Restoration, Stories

  Quoted in Face, Dec. 1986

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• Increase your word power. Words are the raw material of our craft. The greater your vocabulary the more ­effective your writing. We who write in English are fortunate to have the richest and most versatile language in the world. Respect it.

  P. D. James

  Writing, Eye, Voice

  "Ten rules for writing fiction". www.theguardian.com. February, 20 2010.

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• It's possible to fight intolerance, stupidity and fanaticism when they come separately. When you get all three together it's probably wiser to get out, if only to preserve your sanity.

  P. D. James

  Stupid, Fighting, Together

  P. D. James (2011). “Devices and Desires”, p.126, Vintage

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• Books of quotations ... afford me one of the most undemanding but satisfying forms of reading pleasure.

  P. D. James

  Book, Reading, Pleasure

  P. D. James (2011). “Time to Be in Earnest”, p.117, Faber & Faber

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• we can forgive anything as long as it isn't done to us.

  P. D. James

  Forgiveness, Long, Forgiving

  P.D. James (2012). “Innocent Blood”, p.388, Simon and Schuster

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• A nation that can't remember its dead will soon cease to be worth dying for.

  P. D. James

  Dying, Remember, Nations

  P.D. James (2012). “The Skull Beneath the Skin: A Cordelia Gray Mystery”, p.177, Simon and Schuster

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• Write what you need to write, not what is currently popular or what you think will sell.

  P. D. James

  Writing, Thinking, Needs

  "Ten rules for writing fiction", www.theguardian.com. February 19, 2010.

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• I can understand the poor and stupid voting for Marxism or one of its fashionable variants. If you've no hope of being other than a slave, you may as well opt for the most efficient form of slavery.

  P. D. James

  Stupid, Voting, Slavery

  P. D. James (2008). “A Taste for Death”, p.326, Faber & Faber

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• Generosity is a virtue for individuals, not governments. When governments are generous it is with other people’s money, other people’s safety, other people’s future.

  P. D. James

  Government, People, Generosity

  P. D. James (2010). “The Children of Men”, p.137, Vintage

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• Don't just plan to write - write. It is only by writing, not dreaming about it, that we develop our own style.

  P. D. James

  Dream, Writing, Style

  "Your rules for writing" by Michelle Pauli, www.theguardian.com. February 23, 2010.

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• It is always easy to question the judgement of others in matters of which we may be imperfectly informed.

  P. D. James

  Judgement, May, Matter

  P. D. James (2011). “Death Comes to Pemberley: Enhanced Edition”, p.26, Faber & Faber

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• Creativity doesn't flourish in an atmosphere of despotism, coercion and fear.

  P. D. James

  Creativity, Atmosphere, Coercion

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• We can experience nothing but the present moment, live in no other second of time, and to understand this is as close as we can get to eternal life.

  P. D. James

  Moments, Eternal Life, Eternal

  FaceBook post by P.D. James from Jan 20, 2015

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• It shows considerable wisdom to know what you want in life and then to direct all your energies towards getting it.

  P. D. James

  Want, Energy, Shows

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  It was one of those perfect English autumnal days which occur more frequently in memory than in life.

  P. D. James

  Life, Memories, Fall

  P. D. James (2008). “A Taste for Death”, p.339, Faber & Faber

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• to look back on one's life is to experience the capriciousness of memory. ... the past is not static. It can be relived only in memory, and memory is a device for forgetting as well as remembering. It, too, is not immutable. It rediscovers, reinvents, reorganizes. Like a passage of prose it can be revised and repunctuated. To that extent, every autobiography is a work of fiction and every work of fiction an autobiography.

  P. D. James

  Memories, Past, Looks

  P. D. James (2011). “Time to Be in Earnest”, p.15, Faber & Faber

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• What a child doesn't receive he can seldom later give.

  P. D. James

  Children, Parenting, Happy Kid

  P. D. James (2011). “Time to Be in Earnest”, p.11, Faber & Faber

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• however long we have to live, there are never enough springs.

  P. D. James

  Spring, Long, Enough

  P. D. James (2011). “Time to Be in Earnest”, p.289, Faber & Faber

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• I knew the facts of death before I knew the facts of life. There never was a time when I didn't see the skull beneath the skin.

  P. D. James

  Skulls, Skins, Facts

  P.D. James (2012). “The Skull Beneath the Skin: A Cordelia Gray Mystery”, p.159, Simon and Schuster

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• Authors always take rejection badly. They equate it with infanticide.

  P. D. James

  Rejection, Infanticide

  P. D. James (2008). “Original Sin”, p.89, Faber & Faber

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• The modern holy trinity is money, sex and celebrity.

  P. D. James

  Sex, Religion, Modern

  P. D. James (2003). “The murder room”, Alfred a Knopf Inc

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• Work did bestow dignity, status, meaning. Wasn't that why people dreaded unemployment, why some men found retirement so traumatic?

  P. D. James

  Retirement, People, Unemployment

  P. D. James (2012). “Original Sin”, p.77, Vintage

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