Literary Birthday – 26 July – Bernice Rubens

Bernice Rubens was born 26 July 1928, and died 13 October 2004.

Eight Quotes

1. If you’re a writer there will come at least one morning in your life when you wake up and want to kill your agent.
2. [On being a judge for the 1986 Booker Prize:] I got to the point where I couldn’t read a laundry list without considering it for the Booker Prize.
3. I have a kind of habit – I write the book then I do the research to see if I got it right. That’s what normally happens.
4. I don’t particularly enjoy writing, I love having written. I like having ideas – I can have them when I’m in bed or something, nowhere near my desk. Then I can develop them and when I get up I write them. They may not sound so good when you write them down, but I like that aspect very much, when you’re developing in your mind. That’s very exciting.
5. I think I’ve done my bit for teaching because I taught a lot of creative writing, and that’s nice, when you discover a new talent.
6. [On The Booker]… it’s a good prize to win. It doesn’t mean to say you’ve written the best book.
7. A book’s a book, a film’s a film, and if it’s different I don’t get offended.
8. I don’t think I would find a publisher now. They don’t read the books, they weight them, and their accountants play a very huge part in it. It helps to be young, it helps to be pretty, which means you can go on telly – it’s all PR now.

Bernice Rubens was a Booker Prize-winning Welsh novelist. Her early novels included the comedy Set on Edge, Madame Sousatzka, and Mate in Three. She on the Booker Prize for her fourth novel, The Elected Member.

Source for some quotes

 by Amanda Patterson

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