Stephen King Quotes - Page 3

It was only later, replaying the scene in her mind again and again, that she began to believe it was the expression of a man who was methodically unplugging himself from reality, one cord at a time. The face of a man who was heading out of the blue and into the black.

In the end, the wind takes everything, doesn't it? And why not? Why other? If the sweetness of our lives did not depart, there would be no sweetness at all.

The trick is to teach yourself to read in small sips as well as long swallows.

A man who doubts himself shouldn't have to try too hard for too long, not until he's seasoned.

In North Carolina, I stopped to gas up at a Humble Oil station, then walked around the corner to use the toilet. There were two doors and three signs. MEN was neatly stenciled over one door, LADIES over the other. The third sign was an arrow on a stick. It pointed toward the brush-covered slope behind the station. It said COLORED. Curious, I walked down the path, being careful to sidle at a couple of points where the oily, green-shading-to-maroon leaves of poison ivy were unmistakable... There was no facility. What I found at the end of the path was a narrow stream with a board laid across it on a couple of crumbling concrete posts... If I ever give you the idea that 1958's all Andy-n-Opie, remember the path, okay? The one lined with poison ivy. And the board over the stream.

We're not quite ending where we began, but close enough.Close enough.

By definition, though, we are family. And in difficult times-- times like these-- despite our differences, we stand together as family.

She could smell damprot, high, sweet, and cloying. She could smell madness like dead vegetables in a dark cellar.

Fiction is the truth inside the lie.

Time takes it all in the end...

Without story books is like a person with no soul.

You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think.

Henry did not want to be fixed, was somehow convinced that the fix would be a lie, something that would lessen him.

Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule.

Story is honorable and trustworthy; plot is shifty, and best kept under house arrest.

This was it, he knew it, was sure of it, this was the door which would take him back—

When certain seeds are planted, they nearly always grow.

He died with his tie on. Do you think that could be our generation’s equivalent of that old saying about dying with your boots on? Harry Blakemoor died with his tie on. I like it, Larry.

His name is Legion. He is the king of nowhere.

He understood well enough how a man with a choice between pride and responsibility will almost always choose pride--if responsibility robs him of his manhood.

Her support was a constant, one of the few good things I could take as a given. And whenever I see a first novel dedicated to a wife (or a husband), I smile and think, There’s someone who knows.” Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference. They don’t have to make speeches. Just believing is usually enough.

The word is only a representation of the meaning, even at its best, writing almost always falls short of full meaning.

Many writing texts caution against asking friends to read your stuff, suggesting you're not apt to get a very unbiased opinion[.] ... It's unfair, according to this view, to put a pal in such a position. What happens if he/she feels he/she has to say, "I'm sorry, good buddy, you've written some great yarns in the past but this one sucks like a vacuum cleaner"?The idea has some validity, but I don't think an unbiased opinion is exactly what I'm looking for. And I believe that most people smart enough to read a novel are also tactful enough to find a gentler mode of expression than "This sucks." (Although most of us know that "I think this has a few problems" actually means "This sucks," don't we?)

Almost everyone can remember losing his or her virginity, and most writers can remember the first book he/she put down thinking: I can do better than this. Hell, I am doing better than this! What could be more encouraging to the struggling writer than to realize his/her work is unquestionably better than that of someone who actually got paid for his/her stuff?

In the years since, I've discovered there's a lot to be said for boredom.

It always comes down to just two choices. Get busy living, or get busy dying.

...Fritz Leiber, the great fantasist and science fiction writer...called books 'the scholar's mistress'...the one who made no demands and always took him in...

I started after him...and the clown looked back. I saw Its eyes, and all at once I understood who It was.""Who was it, Don?" Harold Gardner asked softly."It was Derry," Don Hagarty said. "It was this town.

The place where you made your stand never mattered. Only that you were there...and still on your feet.

I hope he died of intestinal cancer in a part of the world where morphine is as of yet undiscovered.

Most people are sheep and sheep don't eat meat

So okay― there you are in your room with the shade down and the door shut and the plug pulled out of the base of the telephone. You've blown up your TV and committed yourself to a thousand words a day, come hell or high water. Now comes the big question: What are you going to write about? And the equally big answer: Anything you damn well want.

It's hard enough for a person to keep their own socks pulled up, let alone someone else's.

FEAR stands for fuck everything and run.

(...) if that's what has to be. No good friends. No bad friends. Only people you want, need to be with; people who build their houses in your heart.

Your stuff starts out being just for you, in other words, but then it goes out. Once you know what the story is and get it right - as right as you can, anyway - it belongs to anyone who wants to read it. Or criticize it. If you're very lucky...more will want to do the former than the latter.

History doesn't repeat itself, but it harmonizes, and what it usually makes is the devil's music.

If someone had asked him, “Ben, are you lonely? , ” he would have looked at that someone with real surprise. The question had never even occurred to him. He had no friends, but he had his books and his dreams...

The hardest for man is lie to himself between 3:00 and 6:00 in the morning.

If you've ever been homesick, or felt exiled from all the things and people that once defined you, you'll know how important welcoming words and friendly smiles can be.

Both Rowling and Meyer, they’re speaking directly to young people. … The real difference is that Jo Rowling is a terrific writer and Stephenie Meyer can’t write worth a darn. She’s not very good.

Murder is like potato chips: you can't stop with just one.

You have the right to remain silent,' the big cop said in his robot's voice. 'If you do not choose to remain silent, anything you say may be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. I'm going to kill you. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand your rights as I have explained them to you?

Mrs. Cole was a perfect democrat. She hated all kids equally.

Life could sometimes be grand.

He was nothing but a conduit, after all, and there isn't a culvert in the world that remembers the water flowed through it once the rain has stopped.

I changed it. I had to. Do you know why?" She studied him, her eyes grave. "Because that was then and this is now. Because the past is gone, even though it defines the present.

Write with the door closed, rewrite with the door open.

At the end of her life she was aware of heat but not pain. She had time to consider his eyes, eyes of that blue which is the color of the sky at first light of the morning. She had time to think of him on the Drop, riding Rusher flat out with his black hair flying back from his temples and his neckerchief rippling; to see him laughing with an ease and freedom he would never find again in the long life which stretched out for him beyond hers, and it was his laughter she took with her as she went out, fleeing the light and heat in to the silkly, consoling dark, calling to him over and over as she went, calling bird and bear and hare and fish.

Words have weight.

Why does she have to be such a...such a...""Go on," I said. "The truth is never cussing, Son.""Such a bitch!

The sky was the yellow color of old cheese and the clouds flew across it, as if they had seen something horrifying in the desert wastes where they had so lately been.

Never give a good politician time to pray.

Animals don't know as much about jealousy as people, but they're not ignorant of it, either.

Tony, Tony,come around, something's lost that can't be found.

The Man in Black fled across the desert, and the Gunslinger followed

He who speaks without an attentive ear is mute.

Every man or woman who loves [God], they hate Him too, because He's a hard God, a jealous God, He Is, what He Is, and in this world He's apt to repay service with pain while those who do evil ride over the roads in Cadillac cars. Even the joy of serving Him is a bitter joy.

If you expect to succeed as a writer, rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects. If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway.

At the end of almost every AA meeting, someone read the Promises. One of these was 'We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it'. Dan thought he would always regret the past, but he had quit trying to shut the door. Why bother, when it would just come open again? The fucking had no latch, let alone a lock.