”Do you understand now why I am never bored? For over fifty years I have not stopped working for an instant. From nine o’clock to noon, first sitting. I have lunch. Then I have a little nap and take up my brushes again at two in the afternoon until the[…]
All posts under sonynex5r
246/365 Lonely and marvelous
”I keep a hotel room in which I do my work—a tiny, mean room with just a bed, and sometimes, if I can find it, a face basin. I keep a dictionary, a Bible, a deck of cards and a bottle of sherry in the room. I try to get[…]
245/365 With you constantly
Maugham often felt impatient to begin again. “When you’re writing, when you’re creating a character, it’s with you constantly, you’re preoccupied with it, it’s alive,” he said—adding that when you “cut that out of your life, it’s a rather lonely life.” From “Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find[…]
244/365 I will make it work for me
“I shall always be depressed,” Beckett concluded, “but what comforts me is the realization that I can now accept this dark side as the commanding side of my personality. In accepting it, I will make it work for me.” From “Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and[…]
243/365 It follows me and dogs me
Like Anthony Trollope, James started a new book the instant the old one was finished. Asked once when he found the time to form the design of a new book, James rolled his eyes, patted the questioner on the knee, and said, “It’s all about, it’s about—it’s in the air—it,[…]
242/365 I don’t believe in draining the reservoir
“I don’t believe in draining the reservoir, do you see? I believe in getting up from the typewriter, away from it, while I still have things to say.” Two or three hours in the morning were enough for him, although he stressed the importance of keeping regular hours in order[…]
241/365 A certain amount of distraction
“My finest hours were Watergate, Iran-Contra, the impeachment,” Chuck Close says. The constant chatter can be distracting, he admits, but he claims that this is actually a good thing: “I like a certain amount of distraction. It keeps me from being anxious. It keeps things at a little bit more[…]
240/365 On autopilot
Put part of your life on autopilot; by forming good habits, William James said, we can “free our minds to advance to really interesting fields of action.” From “Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work” by Mason Currey
239/365 Great men turn out to be all alike
“Sooner or later,” Pritchett writes, “the great men turn out to be all alike. They never stop working. They never lose a minute. It is very depressing.” From “Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work” by Mason Currey
264/366 Melusina
Melusine (French:[melyzin] may-loo-zeen) (or melusina) is a figure of European folklore, a feminine spirit of fresh water in a sacred spring or river. She is usually depicted as a woman who is a serpent or fish from the waist down (much like a mermaid). She is also sometimes illustrated with[…]