Thomas Mallon Quotes & Sayings

“Cell phones, alas, have pretty much ruined train travel, which I used to love. I could read or even sketch notes for what I was working on.”

“I actually think that 'Bandbox,' by far the silliest of my books, is the best constructed of them.”

“I've always got a novel under way, but if I try to work on it every day, exclusively, I falter. So I always keep more than one thing going.”

“Letters had always defeated distance, but with the coming of e-mail, time seemed to be vanquished as well.”

“My house in Connecticut is very quiet, and when I'm trying to concentrate, I don't even allow the cat inside my second-floor study.”

“'National Review' came along, in '55, at the moment when American conservatism most needed it.”

“The romantic appeal of solar sailing has ensured that its advocates consistently come from the worlds of both science fiction and science fact.”

“American secretaries of state have typically been more buttoned up than bon vivant, but John Quincy Adams's diplomatic successes - bigger than anything presidential or legislative that he achieved - still surprise a student of his personality.”

“Bobby Kennedy's conduct toward Lyndon Johnson was childish and despicable. As the years went on, he displayed nasty, self-pitying, and messianic qualities that would have made him a dangerously authoritarian president.”

“For almost every novel I've written, I've read the daily newspaper of the time almost as if it were my current subscription. For 'Two Moons,' which was set in 1877, I think I read just about every day of the 'Washington Evening Star' for that year. For 'Henry and Clara,' I read the 'Albany Evening Journal' of the time.”