Top 350 Erica Jong Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Success Quotes, Courage Quotes

2. “Dogs come into our lives to teach us about love and loyalty. They depart to teach us about loss. A new dog never replaces an old dog; it merely expands the heart. If you have loved many dogs, your heart is very big.”

— Erica Jong

3. “And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Boldness Quotes

4. “Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Witty Quotes

5. “Take your life in your own hands, and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Being Strong Quotes

6. “Anger is really disappointed hope.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Anger Quotes

7. “Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. That’s why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.”

— Erica Jong

8. “As long as I’m facing the right direction, it doesn’t matter the size of my steps.”

— Erica Jong

9. “If you don’t risk anything, you risk more.”

— Erica Jong

10. “Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for.”

— Erica Jong

11. “I don’t think you will ever fully understand how you’ve touched my life and made me who I am. I don’t think you could ever know just how truly special you are that even on the darkest nights you are my brightest star.”

— Erica Jong

12. “At fifty the madwoman in the attic breaks loose, stomps down the stairs, and sets fire to the house. She won’t be imprisoned anymore.”

— Erica Jong

13. “Fame means millions of people have the wrong idea of who you are.”

— Erica Jong

14. “Exceptional people are often called crazy by the ordinary world.”

— Erica Jong

15. “Always do the things you fear the most. Courage is an acquired taste, like caviar.”

— Erica Jong

16. “I have not ceased being fearful, but I have ceased to let fear control me.”

— Erica Jong

17. “Conflict is the soul of literature.”

— Erica Jong

18. “If we are all made of God, it is our friends who remind us. We pass the gift of God to them. They pass it back to us when we need it most.”

— Erica Jong

19. “You see a lot of smart guys with dumb women, but you hardly ever see a smart woman with a dumb guy.”

— Erica Jong

20. “Art is always an energy exchange.”

— Erica Jong

21. “The most important education you get is your own – the one you learn in solitude.”

— Erica Jong

22. “If, every day, I dare to remember that I am here on loan, that this house, this hillside, these minutes are all leased to me, not given, I will never despair.”

— Erica Jong

23. “Ambivalence is a wonderful tune to dance to. It has a rhythm all its own.”

— Erica Jong

24. “The soul is awakened through service.”

— Erica Jong

25. “We are so scared of being judged that we look for every excuse to procrastinate.”

— Erica Jong

26. “There are no atheists on turbulent airplanes.”

— Erica Jong

27. “I think professionalism is important, and professionalism means you get paid.”

— Erica Jong

28. “This is the sad bed of chosen chastity because you are miles and mountains away.”

— Erica Jong

29. “I remember everything but forgive anyway.”

— Erica Jong

30. “Jealousy is all the fun you think they had.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Fun Quotes

31. “It takes courage to lead a life. Any life.”

— Erica Jong

32. “Silence is the bluntest of blunt instruments. It seems to hammer you into the ground. It drives you deeper and deeper into your own guilt. It makes the voices inside your head accuse you more viciously than any outside voices ever could.”

— Erica Jong

33. “Surviving means being born over and over.”

— Erica Jong

34. “A wet dream in the mind of New York.”

— Erica Jong

35. “I am old enough to know that laughter, not anger, is the true revelation.”

— Erica Jong

36. “Fear is a sign-usually a sign that I’m doing something right.”

— Erica Jong

37. “My mother wanted me to be her wings, to fly as she never quite had the courage to do. I love her for that. I love the fact that she wanted to give birth to her own wings.”

— Erica Jong

38. “What is the fatal charm of Italy? What do we find there that can be found nowhere else? I believe it is a certain permission to be human, which other places, other countries, lost long ago.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Country Quotes

39. “A new dog never replaces an old dog, it merely expands the heart.”

— Erica Jong

40. “The perfect man is the true partner. Not a bed partner nor a fun partner, but a man who will shoulder burdens equally with you and possess that quality of joy.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Fun Quotes

41. “My reaction to porno films is as follows: After the first ten minutes, I want to go home and screw. After the first twenty minutes, I never want to screw again as long as I live.”

— Erica Jong

42. “Pain is not love. Love flowers; love gives without taking; love is serene and calm.”

— Erica Jong

43. “If there’s anything the world disdains more than uppity young women, it’s uppity old women. Dying young has always been a woman’s best career move.”

— Erica Jong

44. “Home is where your books are.”

— Erica Jong

Featured in: Book Quotes

45. “Where is Hollywood located? Chiefly between the ears. In that part of the American brain lately vacated by God.”

— Erica Jong

46. “Love is everything it’s cracked up to be.”

— Erica Jong

47. “Few women see power as an end in itself. The point of power is the freedom to cultivate roses.”

— Erica Jong

48. “I have lived my life according to this principle: If I’m afraid of it, then I must do it.”

— Erica Jong

49. “Sometimes it was worth all the disadvantages of marriage just to have that: one friend in an indifferent world.”

— Erica Jong

50. “You can’t be creative and still be a good girl.”

— Erica Jong