There is a marvelous turn and trick to British arrogance; its apparent unconsciousness makes it twice as effectual.

There is a marvelous turn and trick to British arrogance; its apparent unconsciousness makes it twice as effectual.

For your born writer, nothing is so healing as the realization that he has come upon the right word.

Biographers, by their very nature, want to know everything about everybody, dead or alive.

In early days, I tried not to give librarians any trouble, which was where I made my primary mistake. Librarians like to be given trouble; they exist for it, they are geared to it. For the location of a mislaid volume, an uncatalogued item, your good librarian has a ferret’s nose. Give her a scent and she jumps the leash, her eye bright with battle.

A woman's biography - with about eight famous historical exceptions - so often turns out to be the story of a man and the woman who helped his career.

In writing biography, fact and fiction shouldn't be mixed. And if they are, the fictional points should be printed in red ink, the facts printed in black ink.