Rex Stout Writing Quotations

I still can't decide which is more fun - reading or writing.

Measure your minds height by the shadow it casts.

The only two kinds of books could earn an American writer a living are cookbooks and detective novels.

There are only two kinds of books which you can write and be pretty sure you're going to make a living — cook books and detective stories.

Every book takes me from 35 to 41 days to write. I don't know why that is. I've tried to get it down to 30 or 31, depending on the length of the month, but it won't work. I don't drink while I'm writing because it fuddles my logical processes, but when I finish a book I go down to the kitchen and pour myself a big belt.

Any man who undertakes to write a play is either a damned fool or a hero, I don't know which. When you write a book, you pull it out of the typewriter and that's that. When you write a play you've got to go on with the producer and the director and the actors and the rehearsals and the ...