Quotes by Erica Jong

About Erica Jong:

Erica Jong is an American author and teacher best known for her fiction and poetry, and particularly for her 1973 novel Fear of Flying. The book became famously controversial for its attitudes towards female sexuality and figured prominently in the development of second-wave feminism. According to Washington Post, it has sold more than 20 million copies worldwide.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

In poetry you can express almost inexpressible feelings. You can express the pain of loss, you can express love. People always turn to poetry when someone they love dies, when they fall in love.

Erica Jong

Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't.

Erica Jong

It is the city of mirrors, the city of mirages, at once solid and liquid, at once air and stone.

Erica Jong

He who can take advice is sometimes superior to him who can give it.

Erica Jong

If you don't risk anything, you risk even more.

Erica Jong

Ambivalence is a wonderful tune to dance to. It has a rhythm all its own.

Erica Jong

Every country gets the circus it deserves. Spain gets bullfights. Italy the Church. America Hollywood.

Erica Jong

Gossip is the opiate of the oppressed.

Erica Jong

And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.

Erica Jong

I have forgotten my rave reviews and memorized my vicious ones - like most writers.

Erica Jong

Is a currency worth anything if no one wants it? We used to buy shoes in Italy. Remember?

Erica Jong

When everyone thinks they know you, it's hard not to be guarded.

Erica Jong

I think professionalism is important, and professionalism means you get paid.

Erica Jong

My generation was not only maligned in book reviews and attacked in graduate school but we lived to see our adored and adorable daughters wonder why feminism had become a dirty word.

Erica Jong

Anybody who instantly goes from being a poet and a graduate student to being a public figure has to be in a state of shock. First people want to praise you, and then they want to attack you. No one can prepare you for it.

Erica Jong

I think that Sappho expresses the orphaned part of ourselves. The orphaned part of ourselves that reaches out to passion for completion. That reaches out to motherhood for completion.

Erica Jong

Show me a woman who doesn't feel guilty and I'll show you a man.

Erica Jong

I write lustily and humorously. It isn't calculated; it's the way I think. I've invented a writing style that expresses who I am.

Erica Jong

All my forebears worked for a living. My grandfather painted portraits. My mother too. My aunt painted seascapes.

Erica Jong

It was unimaginable what happens to you when you get known for a book that everybody reads, or that everybody has heard of. If the book is said to be sexy, the crazies come out of the woodwork.

Erica Jong

I write slowly by hand. Publishing is effectively bankrupt for you unless you are Danielle Steele. It takes a year to write book and advances are going down or disappearing.

Erica Jong

Author Bio

  • NameErica Jong
  • DescriptionNovelist, poet, memoirist, critic
  • BornMarch 26, 1942
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionWriter; Poet; Novelist
  • WorksFear Of Flying