138 Quotes by Lydia Davis

Art is not in some far-off place.

I was tired of so much thinking, which was what I did most in those days. I did other things, but I went on thinking while I did them. I might feel something, but I would think about what I was feeling at the same time. I even had to think about what I was thinking and wonder why I was thinking it.

Read the best writers from all different periods; keep your reading of contemporaries in proportion - you do not want a steady diet of contemporary literature. You already belong to your time.

I am simply not interested, at this point, in creating narrative scenes between characters.

If you think of something, do it.Plenty of people often think, “I’d like to do this, or that.

I can talk for a long time only when it's about something boring.

Just as it is hard for us, in our garden, to stop weeding, because there is always another weed there in front of us, it may be hard for her to stop grazing, because there are always a few more shoots of fresh grass just ahead of her.

I copied the address into my address book, erasing an earlier one that had not been good for very long. No address of his was good for very long and the paper in my address book where his address is written is thin and soft from being erased so often.

The article ends, however, with a cautionary emendation of the opening statement about affection: nowadays many people make love, it says, who do not love each other, or even have any affection for each other, and whether or not this is a good thing we do not yet know.