"There are so many good authors; there's no shortage of them"
About this Quote
The line’s power is its anti-scarcity attitude. Calment isn’t weighing in on a canon; she’s puncturing the myth that greatness is rare and access is fragile. Coming from a celebrity (and a historical oddity), it also flips the usual hierarchy. We expect famous people to anoint favorites, to perform discernment as a kind of status. Calment refuses the performance. Her authority comes not from expertise but from scale: a century of living makes cultural hype look small. Trends rise, reputations wobble, publishers churn; the supply of strong writing persists.
There’s subtext in the repetition, too. "So many" then "no shortage" doubles down, as if she’s insisting against an unseen interviewer’s need for a single recommendation, a single definitive answer. It’s an elegant defense of abundance: read widely, relax your FOMO, stop treating literature like a limited-edition drop. In an attention economy that thrives on scarcity, Calment offers the most radical luxury: calm.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Calment, Jeanne. (2026, January 18). There are so many good authors; there's no shortage of them. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/there-are-so-many-good-authors-theres-no-shortage-13421/
Chicago Style
Calment, Jeanne. "There are so many good authors; there's no shortage of them." FixQuotes. January 18, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/there-are-so-many-good-authors-theres-no-shortage-13421/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"There are so many good authors; there's no shortage of them." FixQuotes, 18 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/there-are-so-many-good-authors-theres-no-shortage-13421/. Accessed 17 Feb. 2026.






