Tim

“... when you go over it, cut out everything you can. The main thing is to know what to leave out. The way you tell whether you’re going good is by what you can throw away.”
― Earnest Hemingway

“Man’s finest workmanship, the closer you observe it, the more imperfections it shows; as in a piece of polished steel a microscope will discover a rough surface. Whereas, what may look coarse and rough in Nature’s workmanship will show an infinitely minute perfection, the closer you look into it. The reason of the minute superiority of Nature’s work over man’s is, that the former works from the innermost germ, while the latter works merely superficially.”
― Nathaniel Hawthorne

“...novels do not begin the way you want them to, but the way they want to.”
― Gabriel García Márquez, Living to Tell the Tale

“There was such a repose and quiet here at this hour, as if the very hill-sides were enjoying the scene, and as we passed slowly along, looking back over the country we had traversed, and listening to the evening song of the robin, we could not help contrasting the equanimity of nature with the bustle and impatience of man. His words and actions presume always a crises near at hand, but she is forever silent and unpretending.” - A Walk to Wachusett”
― Henry David Thoreau