humility Quotes

Of my old tendency to overdo the dedication and deface the title page with florid compliments and obscure quotes which the recipient cannot read, I will say only that I learnt my lesson when I had to shell out with my own money for a hardback I'd vandalised and now limit myself to 'Good wishes.'

Sometimes it's best to speak from ignorance: that way, you can see the wood without being distracted by the trees.

One should take writers' valuations of their own work with a pinch of salt: they are likely to rank them differently tomorrow.

I've been married three times. I married the girl next door when I was 22, and I wasn't a good husband, but I wasn't a good anything then. Nowadays, I'm much kinder.

I was always the youngest person in class, skinny, scrawny, no good at sports. I asserted myself by being smart. But then I got to college and started to get C's and D's. That was fantastic. I no longer had to be the smartest person in the room.

I hate admitting that my enemies have a point.

I'm a world expert on superhero comics. I think maybe only Michael Chabon knows more than me.

I don't know what to say about literary critics. I think it's probably best to say nothing.

I've met the Dalai Lama briefly, but I would probably say my grandfather was the wisest person I ever met. He was my mother's father, an Indian, a family doctor, and very unlike me in that he was deeply religious.

I am a poor man and of little worth, who is laboring in that art that God has given me in order to extend my life as long as possible.