J. K. Rowling

“Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power to that enables us to empathize with humans whose experiences we have never shared.”

“However my parents - both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing quirk that would never pay a mortgage or secure a pension.”

“Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the fates.”

“His priority did not seem to be to teach them what he knew, but rather to impress upon them that nothing, not even... knowledge, was foolproof.”

“I think you're working and learning until you die.”

“Every now and then I read a poem that does touch something in me, but I never turn to poetry for solace or pleasure in the way that I throw myself into prose.”

“'Harry Potter' gave me back self respect. Harry gave me a job to do that I loved more than anything else.”

“I do get recognized, but I must say Edinburgh is a fantastic city to live if you're well-known. There is an innate respect for privacy in Edinburgh people, and I also think they're used to seeing me walking around, so I don't think I'm a very big deal.”

“I don't read 'chick lit,' fantasy or science fiction but I'll give any book a chance if it's lying there and I've got half an hour to kill.”

“I'm interested in that drive, that rush to judgment, that is so prevalent in our society.We all know that pleasurable rush that comes from condemning, and in the short term it's quite a satisfying thing to do, isn't it?”

“Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brain.”

“The thing about the 600 words, I mean some day, you can do a very, very, very hard day's work and not write a word, just revising, or you would scribble a few words.”

“I don't think I am evangelical in my work.”

“If you love something - and there are things that I love - you do want more and more and more of it, but that's not the way to produce good work.”