My favorite book is anything by Kurt Vonnegut – he’s my literary hero. I got to meet him several times, which was a great thrill for me. I don’t really remember what we talked about.

A creation of importance can only be produced when its author isolates himself, it is a child of solitude.

When we see a natural style, we are astonished and charmed; for we expected to see an author, and we find a person.

Silence is one of the great arts of conversation.

The happiest conversation is that of which nothing is distinctly remembered, but a general effect of pleasing impression.

The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech.

I vividly remember a conversation I had many years ago in 1974, which marked a turning point in my leadership journey. I was sitting at a Holiday Inn with my friend, Kurt Campmeyer, when he asked me if I had a personal growth plan. I didn’t. In fact, I didn’t even know you were supposed to have one.

Women have simple tastes. They get pleasure out of the conversation of children in arms and men in love.

It’s so tedious writing cookbooks or writing the recipes because I’ve never been much of a measurer. But to write a book, you have to measure everything.

Prayer is simply a two-way conversation between you and God.

A fortunate author can write maybe twelve novels in his lifetime.

For 20 years, Simon & Schuster asked me, ‚Why don’t you write your autobiography?‘

When I am working on a book or a story, I write every morning as soon after first light as possible. There is no one to disturb you, and it is cool or cold, and you come to your work and warm as you write.

I never liked Hans Christian Andersen because I knew he was always getting at me.

Talking with a friend is nothing else but thinking aloud.

My own books drive themselves. I know roughly where a book is going to end, but essentially the story develops under my fingers. It’s just a matter of joining the dots.

There is no author whose books I look forward to more than Vaclav Smil.

The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.

I am not a self-help writer. I am a self-problem writer. When people read my books, I provoke some things. I cannot justify my work. I do my work; it is up to them to classify it, to judge.

Dickens, as you know, never got round to starting his home page.

There can be no better grounding for a lifetime as an author than to see humanity in all its various guises through the lens of the reporter for the town.

I like writing. I get cranky when I can’t. Yes, I write books back to back, and I work very hard on them.

I haven’t read Horowitz. I didn’t used to read him when he was a Stalinist, and I don’t read him today.

When I write a book, I write a book for myself; the reaction is up to the reader. It’s not my business whether people like or dislike it.

Talking, it seemed to me, was the point of adult existence.

I don’t like to talk much with people who always agree with me. It is amusing to coquette with an echo for a little while, but one soon tires of it.

Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.

The difference is slight, to the influence of an author, whether he is read by five hundred readers, or by five hundred thousand; if he can select the five hundred, he reaches the five hundred thousand.

You might be the funniest guy in the world, but if you don’t have anything to talk about, people are eventually going to gravitate towards the guy that’s actually saying something.

On the way back from Mumbai to go meet with President Xi in China, I stopped in Singapore to meet with a guy named Lee Kuan Yew, who most foreign policy experts around the world say is the wisest man in the Orient.

When I was researching my book ‚The 33 Strategies of War‘, I studied Napoleon extensively and I found myself wanting to ask Napoleon questions about things he did, and if was I interpreting his actions correctly.

Early on, I was so impressed with Charles Dickens. I grew up in the South, in a little village in Arkansas, and the whites in my town were really mean, and rude. Dickens, I could tell, wouldn’t be a man who would curse me out and talk to me rudely.

If a secret history of books could be written, and the author’s private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader!

Half the world is composed of people who have something to say and can’t, and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it.

If I go to Italy, I will certainly request to meet with Pope Francis, whom I admire very much.

You know, we love stories and we love narrative; we love to get lost in an author’s world.

I know Gov. Christie. We’ve met a couple of times.

I didn’t want to be a writer, but I became one. And now I have many readers, in many countries. I think that’s a miracle. So I think I have to be humble regarding this ability. I’m proud of it and I enjoy it, and it is strange to say it this way, but I respect it.

Over the years, people I’ve met have often asked me what I’m working on, and I’ve usually replied that the main thing was a book about Dresden.

There is one way to have a short but exciting conversation with me, and that is to move too slow.

No one would talk much in society if they knew how often they misunderstood others.

‚Royal Beatings‘ was my first story, and it was published in 1977. But I sent all my early stories to ‚The New Yorker‘ in the 1950s, and then I stopped sending for a long time and sent only to magazines in Canada. ‚The New Yorker‘ sent me nice notes, though – penciled, informal messages. They never signed them. They weren’t terribly encouraging.

Well I think any author or musician is anxious to have legitimate sales of their products, partly so they’re rewarded for their success, partly so they can go on and do new things.

I get a thrill meeting kids who are into alternative music.

Despite all I have seen and experienced, I still get the same simple thrill out of glimpsing a tiny patch of snow in a high mountain gully and feel the same urge to climb towards it.

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.

I have an urge to communicate. I think I’m a change from what it would be like dating a normal guy who doesn’t talk too much.

I’m not going to get into the ring with Tolstoy.

I went to a bookstore and asked the saleswoman, ‚Where’s the self-help section?‘ She said if she told me, it would defeat the purpose.

I’m not intelligent. I’m not arrogant. I’m just like the people who read my books. I used to have a jazz club, and I made the cocktails and I made the sandwiches. I didn’t want to become a writer – it just happened.

I miss people. I miss going anywhere and meeting a random person and saying ‚Hi‘ and having a conversation about life. I love people.

Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will.

The writer must earn money in order to be able to live and to write, but he must by no means live and write for the purpose of making money.

I’m writing a book. I’ve got the page numbers done.

I’ll tell you who I absolutely adore: Ian McEwan.

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.

No, it’s not a very good story – its author was too busy listening to other voices to listen as closely as he should have to the one coming from inside.

In America, the professor talks to the mechanic. They are in the same category.

The thing is, ‚Discworld‘ had been going on for a very long time, and I’ve written children’s books as well. Usually when people have a really big series they franchise it, which I thought is a bit of a no-no, so I thought what I’d do is I’d franchise it to myself.

I never experiment with anything in my books. Experimentation means you don’t know what you’re doing.

A critic should be taught to criticise a work of art without making any reference to the personality of the author.