top of page
.png){kind=small}
Quotes by Scottish Authors
"If I have no children what would be the point of living."
"Only mediocrity of enjoyment is allowed to man."
"The most beautiful adventures are not those we go to seek."
"I'd always liked to read, but when I picked up books I wasn't getting the same kind of excitement from them that I was from going out clubbing. I wanted to get the same kind of feel."
"Sarcasm I now see to be, in general, the language of the devil; for which reason I have long since as good as renounced it."
"And in a way, that's been a help to me, because I take great passions for a particular poet - sometimes it lasts for many years, sometimes only for a while. This happens to everybody."
"Now this was one of the things I had been brought up to eschew like disgrace; it being held by my father neither the part of a Christian nor yet of a gentleman to set his own livelihood and fish for that of others, on the cast of painted pasteboard."
"There does not seem to be that collegiality I referred to, there seems to be much more of a them versus us attitude, rather than we all have a role to play in this process so let's get on with it."
"Nothing is more terrible than activity without insight."
"You could read Kant by yourself, if you wanted; but you must share a joke with some one else."
"A business like an automobile, has to be driven, in order to get results."
"Life will always be to a large extent what we ourselves make it."
"But I love New York. I used to set my alarm clock when I was there, and get up at 4am and get a coffee, just because I could."
"Alas! in the clothes of the greatest potentate, what is there but a man?"
"In the New Testament, religion is grace and ethics is gratitude."
"Mrs Beaumont shrugged. 'Dougie travelled light in life,' she said. 'He knew it was people who were important."
"What you see, but can't see over is as good as infinite."
"God is waiting eagerly to respond with new strength to each little act of self-control, small disciplines of prayer, feeble searching after him. And his children shall be filled if they will only hunger and thirst after what he offers."
"So long as we love we serve so long as we are loved by others I would almost say that we are indispensable and no man is useless while he has a friend."
"Writing historical fiction has many common traits with writing sci-fi or fantasy books. The past is another country - a very different world - and historical readers want to see, smell and touch what it was like living there."
"Everybody, soon or late, sits down to a banquet of consequences."
"A paucity of material can open up just as many possibilities."
"Little Sparta is a garden in the traditional sense. It is perhaps not like other modern gardens, but I think that other times would have had no difficulty with it."
"When I went out on tour as Bing Hitler I would hook up with Lenny and we'd get drunk together. He was always very supportive. He was a big star and a lot of what he said to me had power and impact. Apart from that, I just like him."
"A writer is like a stick of rock - the words go right through."
"Friends, if we be honest with ourselves, we shall be honest with each other."
"There is something particularly fascinating about seeing places you know in a piece of art - be that in a film, or a photograph, or a painting."
"There are plenty of ruined buildings in the world but no ruined stones."
bottom of page