E. B. White

“If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a d...”

“Why did you do all this for me?' he asked. 'I don't deserve it. I've never done anything for you.' 'You have been my friend,' replied Charlotte. 'That in itself is a tremendous thing.”

“Reading is the work of the alert mind, is demanding, and under ideal conditions produces finally a sort of ecstasy. This gives the experience of reading a sublimity and power unequalled by a...”

“His words leap across rivers and mountains, but his thoughts are still only six inches long.”

“Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.”

“Humour plays close to the big, hot fire, which is the truth, and the reader feels the heat.”

“Humour can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process.”

“Commuter - One who spends his life in riding to and from his wife; a man who shaves and takes a train, and then rides back to shave again.”

“A poet dares to be just so clear and no clearer; he approaches lucid ground warily, like a mariner who is determined not to scrape his bottom on anything solid. A poet's pleasure is to withh...”

“There is nothing more likely to start disagreement among people or countries than an agreement.”

“I am reminded of the advice of my neighbor. "Never worry about your heart 'til it stops beating."”

“Advice to young writers who want to get ahead without any annoying delays: don't write about Man, write about a man.”

“After all, what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while, we die.”

“Trust me, Wilbur. People are very gullible. They'll believe anything they see in print.”

“Thus I, gone forth, as spiders do, In spider’s web a truth discerning, Attach one silken strand to you For my returning.”

“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.”

“North Brooklin, Maine 30 March 1973 Dear Mr. Nadeau: As long as there is one upright man, as long as there is one compassionate woman, the contagion may spread and the scene is not desolate....”

“Writing is an act of faith, not a trick of grammar.”

“All that I hope to say in books, all that I ever hope to say, is that I love the world.”

“Writing is both mask and unveiling.”