Quotes by Rex Stout

• I still can't decide which is more fun - reading or writing.
• To say that man is a reasoning animal is a very different thing than to say that most of man's decisions are based on his rational process. That I don't believe at all.
• There are two kinds of statistics, the kind you look up and the kind you make up.
• The Glass Key is better than anything Hemingway ever wrote.
• One of the hardest things to believe is that anyone will abandon the effort to escape a charge of murder. It is extremely important to suspend disbelief on that. If you don't, the story is spoiled.
• If I'm home with no chore at hand, and a package of books has come, the television set and the chess board and the unanswered mail will have to manage without me if one of the books is a detective story.
• I think one or two of the later Holmes stories are among the best.
• The minute those two little particles inside a woman's womb have joined together, billions of decisions have been made. A thing like that has to come from entropy.
• To read of a detective's daring finesse or ingenious stratagem is a rare joy.
• I have a strong moral sense - by my standards.
• Hemingway never grew out of adolescence. His scope and depth stayed shallow because he had no idea what women are for.
• Everything in a story should be credible.
• Every Sherlock Holmes story has at least one marvelous scene.
• A character who is thought-out is not born, he or she is contrived. A born character is round, a thought-out character is flat.
• Doyle stokes in a thousand shrewd touches with no effort at all. Wonderful.
• I have never regarded myself as this or that. I have been too busy being myself to bother about regarding myself.
• As a professional writer of detective stories, I string along with the ballplayers. I love a ball game.