James Clavell
James Clavell
James Clavell, born Charles Edmund Dumaresq Clavell, was an Australian-born Britishnovelist, screenwriter, director, and World War II veteran and prisoner of war. Clavell is best known for his epic Asian Saga series of novels and their televised adaptations, along with such films as The Great Escapeand To Sir, with Love...
NationalityAustralian
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth10 October 1924
CountryAustralia
art experts inmates
Changi became my university instead of my prison. ... Among the inmates there were experts in all walks of life - the high and the low roads. I studied and absorbed everything I could from physics to counterfeiting, but most of all I learned the art of surviving.
stars taken men
Isn't man but a blossom taken by wind, and only the mountains and the sea and the stars and this land of the gods everlasting?
wise alive events
Changi for me - of course it's easy to be wise after the event, and to discuss it cleverly after the event - was about as near as you can get to being dead and still be alive.
kings luck together
And Adam ruled, for he was the King. Until the day his will to be King deserted him. Then he died, food for a stronger. And the strongest was always the King, not by strength alone, but King by cunning and luck and strength together. Among the rats.
years doe scarcity
The scarcity of years does not necessitate lack of wisdom.
littles paradox knows
The more I know, the more sure I am I know so little. The eternal paradox.
christian loyalty mean
Love is a Christian word, Anjin-san. Love is a Christian thought, a Christian ideal. We have no word for 'love' as I understand you to mean it. Duty, loyalty, honor, respect, desire, those words and thoughts are what we have, all that we need.
dignity shoguns sufferers
There is no dignity for either the sufferer or the torturer
decision bullets right-time
Guard yourself and your conscience no one else will and know that a bad decision at the right time can destroy you far more surely than any bullet!
beautiful past fleeting
How beautiful life is and how sad! How fleeting, with no past and no future, only a limitless now.
war teenager people
Wars are fought by teenagers, you realize that. They really ought to be fought by the politicians and old people who start these wars." (Interview with Don Swaim of CBS Radio-1986)
book reading writing
I write short stories. They may appear big in size, but when you consider it, they're four or five novels in one. ... In return for picking up one of my books, I'm trying to give them value for their money. ... the goal of writing any book is to create the illusion that what you are reading is reality and you're part of it.
fear laughter laughing
So much of "normal, civilized" life is bull that you can't imagine. ... What frightens you, doesn't frighten me, what frightens me, you'd laugh at.
important world truth-is
The search for the truth is the most important work in the whole world, and the most dangerous.