I used to try to write better than certain dead writers of whose value I was certain. For a long time now I have tried simply to write the best I can. Sometimes I have good luck and write better than I can.

Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) American writer

“Interview with Ernest Hemingway,” George Plimpton, The Paris Review #18 (Spring 1958)

Reprinted in Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises: A Casebook, ed. Linda Wagner-Martin (2002)