E. B. White
American essayist, novelist, and poet
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Writing, for her, was an agonizing ordeal. Writing is hard work for almost everyone; for Katherine it was particularly hard, because she was by temperament and by profession an editor, not a writer. ... Katherine's act of composition often achieved the turbulence of a shoot-out. The editor in her fought the writer every inch of the way; the struggle was felt all through the house. She would write eight or ten words, then draw her gun and shoot them down.
—E. B. White, American essayist, novelist, and poet, Introduction to Katherine S. White, Onward and Upward in the Garden_, 1979
Posted on December 23, 1999 at 12:39 PM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgement, and education — sometimes it's sheer luck, like getting across the street.
—E. B. White, American essayist, novelist, and poet, The Second Tree from the Corner, 1954
Posted on December 7, 1998 at 4:54 PM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Diplomacy is the lowest form of politeness because it misquotes the greatest number of people. A nation, like an individual, if it has anything to say, should simply say it.
—E. B. White, American essayist, novelist, and poet, One Man's Meat, 1944
Posted on April 4, 1998 at 10:52 AM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Commas in The New Yorker fall with the precision of knives in a circus act, outlining the victim.
—E. B. White, American essayist, novelist, and poet, From Writers at Work, 1988
Posted on July 22, 2002 at 7:30 PM
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