Barbara Hannay > Barbara's Quotes

“One is happy once one knows the necessary ingredients of happiness: simple tastes, a certain degree of courage, self denial to a point, love of work, and above all, a clear conscience.”
― George Sand, Correspondance, 1812-1876; Volume 5

“Open a book this minute and start reading. Don’t move until you’ve reached page fifty. Until you’ve buried your thoughts in print. Cover yourself with words. Wash yourself away. Dissolve.”
― Carol Shields, The Republic of Love

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
― Ira Glass

“There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they'll take you.”
― Beatrix Potter

“I think I love you, Bennett. Probably not relevant at the moment so no need to say thanks.”
― Helene Young, Shattered Sky

“I loved him. In a completely platonic, best friend, would not even go there if you were the last guy on earth, sort of way.”
― Theresa Smith, Somebody I Used to Know

“Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow”
― T.S. Eliot, The Hollow Men

“A moody teenager, a divorcee with dreams to take off in a van, and an ageing actress. Such an unlikely combination. An odd bunch. Like pieces taken out of different jigsaw puzzles. They didn’t really belong together. And yet somehow they managed to fit.”
― Barbara Hannay, The Happiest Little Town

“She believed, of course ... because without something to believe in, life would be intolerable.”
― Rosamunde Pilcher, The Shell Seekers