32 Quotes by C. S. Forester

I must be like the princess who felt the pea through seven mattresses; each book is a pea.

The work is with me when I wake up in the morning; it is with me while I eat my breakfast in bed and run through the newspaper, while I shave and bathe and dress.

When I die there may be a paragraph or two in the newspapers. My name will linger in the British Museum Reading Room catalogue for a space at the head of a long list of books for which no one will ever ask.

A man who writes for a living does not have to go anywhere in particular, and he could rarely afford to if he wanted.

There is no other way of writing a novel than to begin at the beginning at to continue to the end.

I have heard of novels started in the middle, at the end, written in patches to be joined together later, but I have never felt the slightest desire to do this.

The doctor who applied a stethoscope to my heart was not satisfied. I was told to get my papers with the clerk in the outer hall. I was medically rejected.

They managed to find time... to tell me that there was no chance of my being accepted for service and that really I should be surprised to still be alive.

I thank God daily for the good fortune of my birth, for I am certain I would have made a miserable peasant.