The Greeks possessed a knowledge of human nature we seem hardly able to attain to without passing through the strengthening hibernation of a new barbarism.
Georg C. LichtenbergRead
The writer who cannot sometimes throw away a thought about which another man would have written dissertations, without worry whether or not the reader will find it, will never become a great writer.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Great writers must be willing to discard their thoughts to enhance their work, regardless of how profound others may find those thoughts.
This quote emphasizes the importance of a writer's ability to let go of ideas that may be intriguing or significant but ultimately do not serve the greater purpose of the narrative. It suggests that true greatness in writing comes from prioritizing the reader's experience and the overall quality of the work over individual thoughts that might have been overvalued.
Themes
WritingIdeasCreativityGreatnessDiscardExpressions
In practice
Example use cases
In a writing workshop, to encourage students to focus on the overall narrative rather than attachments to individual ideas.
More from Georg C. Lichtenberg
All quotes →Many things about our bodies would not seem to us so filthy and obscene if we did not have the idea of nobility in our heads.
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Astronomy is perhaps the science whose discoveries owe least to chance, in which human understanding appears in its whole magnitude, and through which man can best learn how small he is.
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The thoughts written on the walls of madhouses by their inmates might be worth publicizing.
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The noble simplicity in the works of nature only too often originates in the noble shortsightedness of him who observes it.
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Food probably has a very great influence on the condition of men. Wine exercises a more visible influence, food does it more slowly but perhaps just as surely. Who knows if a well-prepared soup was not responsible for the pneumatic pump or a poor one for a war?
Georg C. LichtenbergRead
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