J. K. Rowling

"Failure means a stripping away of the inessential."

"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 imagined being a famous writer would be like being like Jane Austen."

"I just write what I wanted to write. I write what amuses me. It's totally for myself. I never in my wildest dreams expected this popularity."

"If you want to see the true measure of a man, watch how he treats his inferiors, not his equals."

"It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live."

"It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default."

"The fame thing is interesting because I never wanted to be famous, and I never dreamt I would be famous."

"To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."

"Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me."

"You lose your individuality a huge amount when you have no money, and I certainly had that experience."