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Quotes by Australian Authors

"I know a lot of people in the business recommend the many Story Structure seminars being offered here, but I point to them as the single biggest contributor to lousy scripts."

"I worked with my parents on the stage in production numbers since I was 4, but I never really gave much thought to being a performer on my own until I was 12 or 13."

"It wasn't on my agenda, but the thing about getting important awards is it makes the adventure of your career have a little more possibility. I think just what's happened so far is already making the opportunities more interesting, even though I'm at the twilight of my career of like 48 years."

"As we've gotten more successful, there's a gap between the speed of our publishing pipeline and the speed of our receiving submissions pipeline. Our pipeline of leaks has been increasing exponentially as our profile rises, and our ability to publish is increasing linearly."

"The journey of your first movie is not just beyond belief it can be truly beyond satire."

"I start sweating and shaking and having panic attacks if I am not at home."

"The loss of a child is the most terrifying place for me to go."

"I had some vague memory of visiting Canberra as a lad, when we came up with my father by car. But when I made the long train journey from Sydney to Canberra and arrived at the little stop, I did wonder slightly whether this really was the national capital."

"You get the part, sign the contract and start to realize millions of people follow this guy and know more about your character than you do."

"I don't think there's much point in bemoaning the state of the world unless there's some way you can think of to improve it. Otherwise, don't bother writing a book; go and find a tropical island and lie in the sun."

"As a kid, you run around the house pretending to be a superhero, and now to be doing it as a job, I feel very lucky."

"Both my parents were doctors, and my mother had her surgery in the house. There were six children."

"In the cellars of the night, when the mind starts moving around old trunks of bad times, the pain of this and the shame of that, the memory of a small boldness is a hand to hold."

"I actually find it harder to act in the scenes where there's not much happening, say having a milkshake in the diner. That is far harder to do than straight scenes where there's a drama going on and you have something to do."

"I think the Olympics could help us reach more people."

"This is such a special summer holiday for me. I haven't known myself so relaxed in years."

"I'm always shy when I meet people I admire so I wouldn't be able to say anything rather than, 'How do you do? Love you! Bye!'"

"I'll be honest. We copied everyone... the Beatles, the Bachelors. It was the only way people would even listen to you."

"I think in this, definitely, because you are feeling how it felt to live in a completely different time. The mannerisms and the way that people behaved was quite different."

"I feel like I've reached an age where I can relax a little bit with the knowledge of what I've been through, take all that experience and use it. I love the challenge of trying to get back to where I've been, and beyond it."

"National film industries tend to move in cycles. In Australia right now, we're on a high, a feeling of potential, which as yet shows no sign of flagging. But the word "industry" is misleading. A small national cinema has no industry in the Hollywood sense."

"Having children is my greatest achievement. It was my saviour. It switched my focus from the outside to the inside. My children are gifts, they remind me of what's important."

"All I know is that I've ruled out wearing fairy wings. When I was nine I wanted to get married in fairy wings, and now I realize that's not cool anymore."

"Lorna was quite young when her mother died, and I think she's blocked out some of the memories. I talked to her a little bit about that, but I wasn't prepared to go around and poke and hurt her."

"It's so bizarre, I'm not scared of snakes or spiders. But I'm scared of butterflies. There is something eerie about them. Something weird!"

"I cannot be bound to the confines of your rules. I am the exception to them."

"I wish I felt as calm as I look."

"This is the opportunity the fellowship of Jiu Jitsu affords us. To reach our highest potential of self, and then to offer that self to another."

"I almost got a psychology degree, I almost got a philosophy degree. I kept changing it so they couldn't make me graduate. I studied anthropology and eastern religion, epistomology, and astronomy... I took every interesting course I could find for nine years."


"From our broadcasting box you can't see any grass at all. It is simply a carpet of humanity."

"Probably my mother's life was prolonged beyond that of a long-lived family by her coming to Australia in middle life; and if I ever had any tendency to consumption, the climate must have helped me."

"I have not really experienced any significant conflict with anyone in regard to my choice to be vegan, although going out to eat is hard sometimes."

"I don't think in my family anyone looked after anyone. It didn't matter how old they were."

"The mecca of filmmaking in the world just so happens to be in America. It's quite simply a case of us just going where the work is."

"If we went by the world's definition of who I'm supposed to be because I look weird... 'Well, surely, this guy can't have a productive life, surely, he doesn't have a sense of humor. Surely, he can't love life.' We stereotype people in this world. And so... if the world thinks you're not good enough, it's a lie, you know. Get a second opinion."

"The question is, will we continue to fight what may be a rearguard action to defend universal literacy as a central goal of our education system, or are we bold enough to see what's actually happening to our culture?"

"Once I've got the first draft down on paper then I do five or six more drafts, the last two of which will be polishing drafts. The ones in between will flesh out the characters and maybe I'll check my research."

"I got through my teen years by being a bit of a clown."


"None of us is guaranteed against failure or corruption of any kind; witness what's going on in the world in this moment, the follies of human nature and the failures of human nature."

"I thought Erica Jong's Fear of Flying was one of the biggest pieces of crap that I've ever read in my life."

"The wild women in his lap,' my father enthused, 'laying their breasts on his head.'There was a moment of stunned silence. Then my mother spoke slowly, with an edge to her voice. 'I think you mean "wild beasts laying their heads in his lap".''Do I?"

"SDC has a great reputation for putting live music on stage."


"Four hundred wickets is 400 more than I thought I'd get."

"If its a lie,Then let me live,Between the interconnected fabric of truths,Offer me no more,Give me no less."

"All stories are true, Skarpi said. "But this one really happened, if that's what you mean. He took another slow drink, then smiled again, his bright eyes dancing. "More or less. You have to be a bit of a liar to tell a story the right way. Too much truth confuses the facts. Too much honesty makes you sound insincere."


"I wouldn't dream of selling my work. I give them to friends, to charities."

"You know like it has its own personality, its own character."

"There are no limits, love, there are no limits."
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