Bernard Cornwell Quotes (37 Quotes)

I'm fortunate that the books sell, but even more fortunate to live in Chatham, to be very happily married and to have, on the whole, a fairly clear conscience.

In the end their appeal is not necessarily the history, but the quality of the story-telling, and a good story transcends national boundaries.

I start early - usually by 5 am, and work through to 5 pm, with breaks for lunch, boring exercise, etc etc. But it's usually a full day.

It's better than 9 to 5 because I'm my own boss so I can take off when I want to, and the dress code is non-existent and the commute is terrific.

Book tours and research provide a lot of travel - too much, I sometimes think, but we do take vacations.

So the books have a greater appeal to a British audience, but that hasn't stopped them making best-seller lists in places like Brazil, Japan and at least a dozen other countries.

I'll happily mentor anyone who wants mentoring, and most of that goes on by internet rather than face to face.

At risk of sounding foully pompous I think that writers' groups are probably very useful at the beginning of a writing career.

And though I've lived in the States for over 25 years and am now an American citizen, I still hear British voices in my head.

Mind you, even in places where I'm much better known, I walk in anonymity, mainly because folks know authors' names, but not their faces.

Not sure what I'd so with a notebook other than swat flies. If I want a break I'd rather go down to Stage Harbor and talk boats.

I'd like to cut it down to three books in two years instead of two a year - but whether that'll happen I don't know.

I still have to crack the French market, though that isn't entirely surprising considering that the Sharpe novels are endless tales of French defeat.

Judy couldn't move to Britain for family reasons, so I had to come to the States, and the U.S. government wouldn't give me a Green Card, so I airily told her I'd write a book.

Agents will read unpublished work because they might make money, and that's their job. It isn't mine.

It's fun. I sit down every day and tell stories. Some folk would kill to get that chance.

I did a TV series for the British History Channel a few years ago and for a few weeks afterwards I was accosted by folk in Britain wanting to talk, which was flattering, but the memory faded and blessed anonymity returned.

But publishers are in the business of making profits, so they love getting two books a year. They'd have three if they could.

What I mean by that is that the point of life, as I see it, is not to write books or scale mountains or sail oceans, but to achieve happiness, and preferably an unselfish happiness.

I know nothing about producing TV drama and any involvement on my part is liable to prove an obstacle to the producers, so I prefer to be a cheerleader and let them get on with it.

Then you start another book and suddenly the galley proofs of the last one come in and you have to wrench your attention away from what you're writing and try to remember what you were thinking when you wrote the previous one.

Writing is a solitary occupation.

Of course some days are easier than others, but my worst day is better than being in most humdrum occupations.

The discrepancy is entirely based, I think, on the fact that I write best when I'm writing about what I know, and that is British history.

I have a terrific, marvellous, unbelievably helpful editor in London and she has the biggest influence, but even so we disagree as much as we agree.

I volunteered for this life, wanted it and am not going to bitch about it now that I've got it.

So far it's 43 books in 25 years.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if the first book had not sold... doesn't bear thinking about, but I suppose we'd have made it work somehow.

One book at a time... though I'm usually doing the research for others while I'm writing, but that sort of research is fairly desultory and I like to stick to the book being written - and writing a book concentrates the mind so the research is more productive.

I'm a success inasmuch that I enjoy my life, which is an enormous blessing and that doesn't depend on commercial success (though I wouldn't be such a fool as to deny that it helps).

Anyone who claims to have an entirely clear conscience is almost certainly a bore.

Looking back, of course, it was irresponsible, mad, forlorn, idiotic, but if you don't take chances then you'll never have a winning hand, and I've no regrets.

We have a gaff-rigged topsail cutter, which sounds much grander than she really is, but she's exquisitely beautiful and shamefully slow and we spend a lot of time aboard when we can.

Television is a young person's medium.

Actually I moved to New Jersey in 1980 and didn't discover Chatham until 1990, by which time the books were selling, but it was still a daft decision, based solely on love.

And yes, there's a simplicity to writing books because you're not a member of a team, so you make all the decisions yourself instead of deferring to a committee.

I took time off last year to sail the Atlantic, and if I got more opportunities for blue-water cruising I might take them.