The ocean is the only alien and potentially hostile environment on the planet into which we tend to venture without thinking about the animals that l…

- Peter Benchley

Writing is sweat and drudgery most of the time. And you have to love it in order to endure the solitude and the discipline.

- Peter Benchley

No, the shark in an updated JAWS could not be the villain; it would have to be written as the victim, for, worldwide, sharks are much more the oppres…

- Peter Benchley

The past always seems better when you look back on it than it did at the time. And the present never looks as good as it will in the future.

- Peter Benchley

There's nothing in the sea this fish would fear. Other fish run from bigger things. That's their instinct. But this fish doesn't run from anything. H…

- Peter Benchley

I know now that the mythic monster I created was largely a fiction.

- Peter Benchley

If man doesn't learn to treat the oceans and the rain forest with respect, man will become extinct.

- Peter Benchley

I believe implicitly that every young man in the world is fascinated with either sharks or dinosaurs.

- Peter Benchley

I read very widely, both non-fiction and fiction, so I don't think there's a single writer who influences me.

- Peter Benchley