Ken Follett Quotes and Sayings - Page 1
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“Why do you have to be the same as the others? ...Most of them are stupid.”
-- Ken Follett -
“She loved him because he had brought her back to life. She had been like a caterpillar in a cocoon, and he had drawn her out and shown her that she was a butterfly.”
-- Ken Follett -
“Having faith in God did not mean sitting back and doing nothing. It meant believing you would find success if you did your best honestly and energetically.”
-- Ken Follett -
“In my books, women often solve the problem. Even if the woman is not the hero, she's a strong character. She does change the plot. She'll often rescue the male character from some situation.”
-- Ken Follett -
“Trusting someone was like holding a little water in your cupped hands - it was so easy to spill the water, and you could never get it back.”
-- Ken Follett -
“When you've lost everything, you've got nothing to lose.”
-- Ken Follett -
“Nevertheless, the book gave Jack a feeling he had never had before, that the past was like a story, in which one thing led to another, and the world was not a boundless mystery, but a finite thing that could be comprehended.”
-- Ken Follett -
“The thriller is the most popular literary genre of the 20th century.”
-- Ken Follett -
“She wanted to say 'I love you like a thunderstorm, like a lion, like a helpless rage'...”
-- Ken Follett -
“Why was it, Lloyd wondered, that the people who wanted to destroy everything good about their country were the quickest to wave the national flag?”
-- Ken Follett -
“When you're thinking, please remember this: excessive pride is a familiar sin, but a man may just as easily frustrate the will of God through excessive humility.”
-- Ken Follett -
“We’re all good when it suits us, he used to say: that doesn’t count. It’s when you want so badly to do something wrong—when you’re about to make a fortune from a dishonest deal, or kiss the lovely lips of your neighbor’s wife, or tell a lie to get yourself out of terrible trouble—that’s when you need the rules. Your integrity is like a sword, he would say: you shouldn’t wave it until you’re about to put it to the test.”
-- Ken Follett -
“President Wilson says a leader must treat public opinion the way a sailor deals with the wind, using it to blow the ship in one direction or another, but never trying to go directly against it.”
-- Ken Follett -
“A baby was like a revolution, Grigori thought: you could start one, but you could not control how it would turn out.”
-- Ken Follett -
“Man who betrayed you once would betray you twice.”
-- Ken Follett -
“I read mostly fiction, a lot of 19th-century novels.”
-- Ken Follett -
“Ethel said: "Lloyd, there's someone here you may remember-" Daisy could not restrain herself. She ran to Lloyd and threw herself into his arms. She hugged him. She looked into his green eyes, then kissed his brown cheeks and his broken nose and then his mouth. "I love you, Lloyd," she sad madly. "I love you, I love you, I love you." "I love you, too, Daisy," he said. Behind her, Daisy heard Ethel's wry voice. "You do remember, I see.”
-- Ken Follett -
“The boundary between philosophy and fiction is not as clear cut as you may think and the two definitely interact..”
-- Ken Follett -
“The degradation to which you subject others comes back, sooner or later, to haunt you,”
-- Ken Follett -
“I have quite a few different Bibles. Having rejected my parents' religion, I still think the King James Bible is the most important work of literature in English. None of us can help being influenced by it.”
-- Ken Follett -
“One of the hardest things for me, now that I'm famous, is finding people who can read my stuff and give me an honest critique.”
-- Ken Follett -
“It's great that in the German language I've sold almost 30 million books. Isn't that amazing?”
-- Ken Follett -
“I want to tell a story that makes the reader always want to see what will happen next.”
-- Ken Follett -
“I might not be a good socialist, any more than I'm a good Christian, but I am one.”
-- Ken Follett -
“I like reading history, and actually most authors enjoy the research part because it is, after all, easier than writing.”
-- Ken Follett -
“I am very fond of Edith Wharton. She's quite high brow but also a great storyteller. My favorite is 'The House of Mirth.' I also like 'The Reef.”
-- Ken Follett -
“I aim to be translucent, so you don't notice the words, just their meaning. I haven't much insight into people's motivations.”
-- Ken Follett