Biographies Quotes - Page 2

• We have escapist fiction, so why not escapist biography?

  John Kenneth Galbraith

  Why Not, Fiction, Economy

  1980 In the NewYork Times, 27 Jul.

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• The art of biography is different from geography. Geography is about maps, but biography is about chaps.

  E. C. Bentley

  Art, Different, Maps

  'Biography for Beginners' (1905) introduction

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• What use is there for a biography of myself? I'm just a movie actor.

  Conrad Veidt

  Use, Actors, Movie Actors

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• There is properly no history, only biography.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Funny Life, History, Historical

  Essays "History" (1841)

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• One good anecdote is worth a volume of biography.

  William Ellery Channing

  Anecdotes, Volume, Speakers

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• The personal vocabulary, the individual melody whose metre is one's biography, joins in that sound, with any luck, and the body moves like a walking, a waking island.

  Derek Walcott

  Moving, Vocabulary, Islands

  Derek Walcott (2014). “What the Twilight Says: Essays”, p.79, Macmillan

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• I had no expectation that the Prince would offer me the unprecedented and unfettered access to the original and entirely untapped sources on which this biography is based.

  Jonathan Dimbleby

  Expectations, Source, Offers

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• Even if you only want to write science fiction, you should also read mysteries, poetry, mainstream literature, history, biography, philosophy, and science.

  Walter Jon Williams

  Philosophy, Writing, Science

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• At the Sex Institute in Bloomington, Indiana, they were a phenomenal help, too. We went out there for a few days, and they gave us access to materials. And the biographies, there are four or five, ranging from very poor to excellent.

  Liam Neeson

  Sex, Four, Indiana

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• In writing biography, fact and fiction shouldn't be mixed. And if they are, the fictional points should be printed in red ink, the facts printed in black ink.

  Catherine Drinker Bowen

  Writing, Black, Ink

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• Some of those drawn into the holy war had been secular nationalists only a few years before. If one looks at the biographies of these people, remarkable continuities are revealed.

  Jurgen Habermas

  War, Years, People

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• John Kerry's biography was central to his campaign.

  Mark Shields

  Campaigns, John Kerry

  "Shields and Kristol Discuss Kerry’s War Record". "PBS NewsHour" with Jim Lehrer, www.pbs.org. August 20, 2004.

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• I suppose I'm proudest of my novels for what's imagined in them. I think the world of my imagination is a richer and more interesting place than my personal biography.

  John Irving

  Thinking, Imagination, Interesting

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• There's been a number of erroneous biographies, articles and so on written about Billy and we both thought it would be a good idea to produce a true one.

  Pamela Stephenson

  Ideas, Numbers, Would Be

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• I think that every so-called history book and film biography should be prefaced by the statement that what follows is the author's rendition of events and circumstances.

  Barbara Kruger

  Book, Artist, Thinking

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• Those who have no record of what their forebears have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history.

  Carter G. Woodson

  Teacher, Retirement, Teaching

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• I read everything: fiction, history, science, mathematics, biography, travel.

  Martin Lewis Perl

  Travel, Fiction, Mathematics

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• The Holocaust is a central event in many people's lives, but it also has become a metaphor for our century. There cannot be an end to speaking and writing about it. Besides, in Israel, everyone carries a biography deep inside him.

  Aharon Appelfeld

  Writing, Israel, People

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• I didn't want to write a biographie romancee especially since I already write novels, nor did I want to challenge the rules of the biography game, arbitrary as those rules might be

  Edmund White

  Writing, Games, Challenges

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• On the other hand, when I give it closer thought, I realize I'm not enough of a dictator to conduct an orchestra because it requires a pretty awful person. When you read these biographies of famous conductors, they are all awful people who fail in their private relationships.

  Eberhard Weber

  Hands, People, Giving

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• While writing my first 90 books, I was magazine editor, publisher, book publisher, executive, etc., so I was established in publishing. three of my seven or so books were biographies of sports stars and really opened doors for me in that area.

  Jerry B. Jenkins

  Sports, Stars, Book

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• I never wanted to do biography just to tell the life of a famous man. I always wanted to use the life of a man to examine political power, because democracy shapes our lives

  Robert Caro

  Men, Political, Democracy

  FaceBook post by Robert A. Caro from Aug 26, 2011

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• Just how difficult it is to write biography can be reckoned by anybody who sits down and considers just how many people know the real truth about his or her love affairs.

  Rebecca West

  Love, Real, Writing

  "The Art of Scepticism" (1952)

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• I have had the unfortunate experience of having someone write an unauthorised biography of me. Half of it is lies and the other half is badly written. My feeling is that if I'm going to write my life story, I ought to have my life first.

  Dawn French

  Lying, Writing, Feelings

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• The big biography of Lincoln necessarily had to do so much with his political career, his ambitions, his accomplishments in public, with less time to spend on his private life, his inner life, and I thought this might be a way of getting at that.

  David Herbert Donald

  Ambition, Careers, Accomplishment

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