Ernest Hemingway Quotes

An author places himself uncalled before the tribunal of criticism and solicits fame at the hazard of disgrace.

The greater part of critics are parasites, who, if nothing had been written, would find nothing to write.

Reviewers are usually people who would have been, poets, historians, biographer, if they could. They have tried their talents at one thing or another and have failed; therefore they turn critic.

Pay no attention to the criticism of men who have never themselves written a notable work.

There are writers who go their whole lives and never hit that No. 1 spot.

There are those who write because they believe they have something so marvelous that it will make them famous and wealthy, a lauded commodity who will be invited to a lifetime of cocktail parties.

The great American novel has not only already been written, it has already been rejected.

In the '50s, critics used to say I had a 'dangerous' act.

A novelist who writes nothing for 10 years finds his reputation rising. Because I keep on producing books they say there must be something wrong with this fellow.

It would not be fair to the critics of Rotary, who include some of the most brilliant of the British and American writers, to charge them with prejudice.

Critics! Those cut-throat bandits in the paths of fame.

You are only as good as your last book, and so there has to be a book.

One of the strangest results of having your name on a book jacket is the proliferation of people who know one narrow aspect of your life and are suddenly surprised to learn there's more.

It's the price of success: people start to think you're omnipotent.

There's no end to the inventiveness of critics, I tell you. Because they can't write fiction, they put their impulse into their analysis of work.

My second play, The Birthday Party, I wrote in 1958 - or 1957. It was totally destroyed by the critics of the day, who called it an absolute load of rubbish.

If we're a hit, let 'em say anything they want.

I've been lucky. The critics never went out of their way to single me out for doing bad work.

Nothing recedes like success.

This is an imperfect world, as actors, athletes, priests and presidents soon discover. Writers have known this from the day they read their first review.

I never considered myself a writer. I'm a teacher. In a way, I feel kind of... kind of guilty for all the people who are writers who hope to be on the best-seller list someday, who live for that and don't get it, and it came to me as a kind of free gift, like God coming to Abraham and announcing, 'I've chosen you!'

In the two novels I have published, it was my fortune at different times, and from different persons, to hear the most unqualified censure long before it was possible for me to hear the voice of the public. But my temper was not altered, nor my courage subdued.

Not even the severest critics of Jeffrey Archer can deny his style.

With success always comes criticism. I've been criticized every year of my life.