A Few Favorite Quotes by Diana Flegal

I like to begin my workshops by sharing a few of my favorite quotes. Today I am going to share a few of them in the hopes they may inspire you, make you laugh and above all, help us not to take ourselves too seriously!

Writers aren’t exactly people…they are a whole lot of people trying to be one person.

                                                                            F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)

I write because I want more than one life; I insist on a wider selection. It is greed plain and simple. When my characters join the circus, I’m joining the circus. Although I’m happily married, I spend a great deal of time mentally living with incompatible husbands.

                                                                                         Ann Tyler (1941-    )

I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have yet gone ourselves.

                                                                                          E. M. Forster       

                                                                                          “Two Cheers for Democracy” (1951)

A well composed book is a magic carpet on which we are wafted to a world that we cannot enter in any other way.                                                               Caroline Gordan (1895-1981)

   

A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return.                                                                                Samuel Rushdie

                                                                                          Imaginary Homelands (1992)

In all my work what I try to say is that as human beings we are more alike than we are unalike.

                                                                                           Maya Angelou

                                                                                           Interview in The New York Times                                                

                                                                                           (January 20, 1993)

It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing, but I couldn’t give it up because by that time I was too famous.                             Robert Benchley (1889-1945)

I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew as well. Unfortunately, I am confined to this theme by the narrowness of my experience.

                                                                                            Henry David Thoreau

                                                                                            Walden (1854)      

I like a thin book because it will steady a table, a leather volume because it will strop a razor, and a heavy book because it can be thrown at a cat.                                 Mark Twain (1835-1910)

And last but not least:

Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of the night. 

                                                                                              Attributed to P. J. O’Rouke (1947-

"The last thing that we find in making a book is to know what we must put first."                                                                                              Blaise Pascal

Please add a few of your own. 

                                                                                                                

Moved with Compassion by Diana L. Flegal

All of us are drawn back to our favorite authors. We like their particular voice, how they build their suspense or weave the happy ending to their love story, place us into an historical event, or construct a world we could never imagine ourselves but enjoy all the same.

My favorite authors, fiction and nonfiction, are skilled at putting into words my thoughts I couldn’t have expressed. They also teach me something of myself, providing me A-hah moments. Yes, I do feel that way or stoop that low at times. A light is shown in a corner of me and I am usually the better for it if I allow the words to do what words can do.

Well said/placed words can convict and set free the reader/listener.

One of the best examples of a convicting word is found in 2 Samuel 12. “Thou art the man.” Powerful.

In Sundays message my pastor, Nick Honerkamp, shared a picture of Jesus that I knew I appreciated but he boiled it down to three things.

He saw

He was moved with compassion

And He prayed.

Not everyone sees us. We scurry about, pass our neighbors, our coworkers, and fail to see the heartbreak in their eyes, the questions they desperately seek answers for. Maybe we avoid them on purpose. Our lives already overwhelmed with personal troubles. Our light hid under a bushel basket.

Sunday, after that message, I pulled onto my lap Christa Parrish’s recent release, Stones for Bread.  And I realized why I love her writing and anticipate her next books release. She helps me see, moves me with compassion and I pray- for those around me, in a fresh way. These are the stories I am drawn to.

A reviewer of this book of Christa’s said…’this book is not an easy read, I struggled through it…

I agree, It pained me reading of her protagonists painful childhood, yet I celebrated each baby step forward, fell in love with the various members of the community that enfolded her, and the unexpected love that broke through her defenses. I saw, I was moved and I was prayerful, even brought to worship as I closed the book at her stories end. God is good. He sees us and waits to meet us.

I encourage you to write thoughtfully.