Maxwell Perkins Quotes

#1. Whenever any of these new writers come up who are brilliant, I always realize that you have more talent and more skill than any of them;---but circumstances have prevented you from realizing upon the fact for a long time. [About F. Scott Fitzgerald]

Maxwell Perkins

#2. I believe the writer ... should always be the final judge. I have always held to that position and have sometimes seen books hurt thereby, but at least as often helped. The book belongs to the author.

Maxwell Perkins

#3. What we publishers think is that our function is to bring everything out into the open, on the theory that we have an adult population that knows values, or can learn them, and let them decide.

Maxwell Perkins

#4. You have to throw yourself away when you write.

Maxwell Perkins

#5. You can't know a book until you come to the end of it, and then all the rest must be modified to fit that.

Maxwell Perkins

#6. I do not think anyone can read War and Peace too much. I read it six times ...

Maxwell Perkins

#7. It often puzzles me when people think that matters connected with sex ought to be suppressed. Sex itself cannot be suppressed, and the efforts to do it, it seems to me, result in greater damage than it can do itself. After all, it was not an invention of man, but of God.

Maxwell Perkins

#8. I think the novel is a wonder....it has vitality to an extraordinary degree, and glamour, and a great deal of underlying thought of unusual quality....And as for the sheer writing, it's astonishing. [About The Great Gatsby]

Maxwell Perkins

#9. If you are not discouraged about your writing on a regular basis, you may not be trying hard enough. Any challenging pursuit will encounter frequent patches of frustration. Writing is nothing if not challenging.

Maxwell Perkins

#10. The book belongs to the author.

Maxwell Perkins

#11. Editors are extremely fallible people, all of them. Don't put too much trust in them.

Maxwell Perkins

#12. It is those people who know that they are right because some outside or higher power conveys the conviction to them who do the great damage in the world.

Maxwell Perkins

#13. Learn about writing from reading. That is the right way to do it.

Maxwell Perkins

#14. Writing, like drawing is an art, and whatever conveys the meaning is justified.

Maxwell Perkins

#15. You are all right on time, except for the fact that time is the enemy of us all, and especially of the writer.

Maxwell Perkins

#16. Every good thing that comes is accompanied by trouble.

Maxwell Perkins

#17. Of the whole public not a handful can understand the artist's point of view or the writer's conscience.

Maxwell Perkins

#18. I do not think you should read about writing while you are writing.

Maxwell Perkins