J.J. Brown Quotes

I hate the telephone. I think the lowest circle of hell is reserved for Alexander Graham Bell.

If you like my novels, I commend your good taste.

Not until my middle thirties did I consider myself a novelist.

He tried to drown his troubles but they knew how to swim.

Dad could charm a dog off a meat wagon.

Lesbianism, politically organized, is the greatest threat that exists to male supremacy.

Every action is either strong or weak, and when every action is strong we are successful.

It's an act of faith to be a writer in a postliterate world.

Never hope for it more than you work for it.

Alcohol is an allergy of the body and an obsession of the mind.

Don't hope more than you're willing to work.

I have always been suspicious of romantic love. It looks too much like a narcissism shared by two.

Death is a greatly overrated experience. I hated Mother's and I'm not looking forward to my own. Apart from the sorrow there are the bills to be paid. Nobody dies for free.

Guilt is a Jewish invention improved upon by Christians for the last two thousand years.

We all want to leave our children the Garden of Eden and we wind up giving them hardscrabble.

I believe all literature started as gossip.

Gambling operates under the premise that greed can be satisfied by luck.

There are very few people who are creative and imaginative. Therefore, fiction is difficult for people to embrace.

Gossip is irresponsible communication.

The last thing I have to say is that ice is the past tense of water. I've always wanted to write that sentence and now I have.

A controller doesn't trust his/her ability to live through the pain and chaos of life. There is no life without pain just as there is no art without submitting to chaos.

If critics want to help me, let them come sit next to me while I'm writing.

Would it upset men if they found out we weren't different? Are we? Aren't we? Damned if I know.

I don't expect executives to be creative but I do expect them to have courage.

I earned two Emmy nominations for writing, and two of the shows I had written were nominated for best in their category.

Never underestimate the power of self-absorption, including your parents' self-absorption.

Never measure literature by accounting statistics. A quarter of working authors earn less than $1,000.

Never let anyone or any social attitude stand in the way of your productivity.

the reason for revolution is so the good things in life circulate.

We animals live life in all its glorious uncertainty. Why do politicians think they can control events?

A narcissism shared by two.

Why marry a woman if you're going to betray her, and if you're going to betray her, why beat her? The fault is not hers ... I sometimes think the worst we do, we do behind closed doors.

English is weak in describing emotional states or intensities of interpersonal relationships.

Monogamy is contrary to nature but necessary for the greater social good.

Armies are dependent on youthful male ignorance.

Trouble is said to be good for an artist's soul but almost never is.

If Michaelangelo were a heterosexual, the Sistine Chapel would have been painted basic white and with a roller.

The only good thing ever done by a committee was the King James version.

Golf is an expensive way to make yourself miserable.

Book tours are like boot camp but with little sleep and less food.

Seriousness is the refuge of the shallow. There are events and personal experiences that call forth seriousness but they are fewer than most of us think.

There are more differences between poor people than between middle-class people.

Two wrongs don't make a right. No, but three will get you back on the freeway!

Mother believed in enjoying herself. Aunt Mimi believed in enjoying herself, then feeling guilty about it.

Put your money in your head, that way no one can take it from you.

The human animal varies from class to class, culture to culture. In one way we are consistent: We are irrational.

I do think women avoid power. Power assumes responsibility and accountability, and I think many, many women want to have it both ways.

I had to learn the image is not the word, which is a jolt for a literary soul. But it has served me well in terms of understanding plot, in terms of watching actors develop characters.

I love literature, the English language and storytelling. I also have thirty horses and seventy foxhounds to feed.

You can't go back and edit during the live set in the club. In the studio it's different.