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My family life reads a bit like 'Little House on the Prairie.' I was big sister to Joan, Renee, and brother William, and we grew up in Dalkey, a little town 10 miles outside of Dublin. It was a secure, safe and happy childhood, which was meant to be a disadvantage when it comes to writing stories about family dramas.
Maeve Binchy -
On my 100th birthday, piloting Gordon and myself into the side of a mountain.
Maeve Binchy
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I was just lucky I lived in this time of mass-market paperbacks.
Maeve Binchy -
I'm an escapist kind of writer.
Maeve Binchy -
I never wanted to write. I just wrote letters home from a kibbutz in Israel to reassure my parents that I was still alive and well fed and having a great time. They thought these letters were brilliant and sent them to a newspaper. So I became a writer by accident.
Maeve Binchy -
When I was teaching Latin in girls' schools before I became a writer, I didn't much like it if parents would come in and say, 'We'll have less of the Ovid and Virgil and more of the grammar, please.' After all, I was the one in charge. That's how I feel about doctors. You should trust them to do their job properly.
Maeve Binchy -
I have great family and good friends; the stories I told became popular, and people all over the world bought them.
Maeve Binchy -
Women who start out as ugly ducklings don't become beautiful swans. What they mainly become is confident ducks. They take charge of their lives.
Maeve Binchy
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My father went to work by train every day. It was half an hour's journey each way, and he would read a paperback in four journeys. After supper, we all sat down to read - it was long before TV, remember!
Maeve Binchy -
If I see Marian Keyes' books or Patricia Scanlan's books given more prominence than mine in the bookstore, I'll move mine to the front. I've told them I do this, and they've confessed to doing the same thing to me.
Maeve Binchy -
Happiness is in our own hearts. I have no regrets of anything in the past. I'm totally cheerful and happy, and I think that a lot of your attitude is not in the circumstances you find yourself in, but in the circumstances you make for yourself.
Maeve Binchy -
On the first day of school, my father told me I'd be the most popular girl and everyone would love me and want to be my friend. It wasn't so, but it gave me an enormous amount of confidence.
Maeve Binchy -
I believed that old people never laughed. I thought they sighed a lot and groaned. They walked with sticks, and they didn't like children on bicycles or roller skates... or with big dogs.
Maeve Binchy -
I'm a great will maker. I've made my will every year since I was 21.
Maeve Binchy
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That's the kind of motif I bring to the books - that people take charge of their own lives.
Maeve Binchy -
There are no makeovers in my books. The ugly duckling does not become a beautiful swan. She becomes a confident duck able to take charge of her own life and problems.
Maeve Binchy -
Because I saw my parents relaxing in armchairs and reading and liking it, I thought it was a peaceful grown-up thing to do, and I still think that.
Maeve Binchy -
I've had a good life, full of more success and happiness than I ever expected.
Maeve Binchy -
I discovered that men were just like everyone else, really. They liked you if you were good-tempered and easy to talk to. And being a big girl meant other females trusted you more and confided in you.
Maeve Binchy -
I was fat, and that was awful because when you're young and sensitive, you think the world is over because you're fat.
Maeve Binchy
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I've been very lucky and I have a happy old age with good family and friends still around.
Maeve Binchy -
Most people, once the money started getting bigger, thought we would buy a millionaire's house looking out at the sea - but what would two middle-aged people do that for? We were sensible enough when we got it.
Maeve Binchy -
I think I'm brave because I've made decisions based - I hope not entirely selfishly - on what I think is right for me to do next.
Maeve Binchy -
If you woke up each morning, and immediately dwelt on your ills, what sort of a day could you look forward to?
Maeve Binchy