John Irving Quotes

'The Fourth Hand' was a novel that came from twenty years of screenwriting concurrently with whatever novel I'm writing.

John Irving

• Writing
• Hand

• Previous
• Next

Quotes to Explore

• The story was such that I couldn't make a graceful ending and then make a graceful new beginning. I could have, but I didn't want to. So, it isn't the most graceful way of writing a story. This new story is, I think, is pretty good stuff. I'm pleased with it anyway.

  

  Jack Vance
  • Good
  • Writing
  • Pretty

• I've been writing a lot of poetry recently. It helps me think and work things out.

  

  Ed Westwick
  • Work
  • Writing
  • Poetry

• I've got plenty of quirks. I go to an office early in the morning. Early in the morning is really good writing time. I take anywhere between six to eight showers a day. I'm not exaggerating. I'm not a germaphobe: it's all about a fresh start.

  

  Aaron Sorkin
  • Time
  • Good
  • Writing

• Writing is like a contact sport, like football. You can get hurt, but you enjoy it.

  

  Irwin Shaw
  • Writing
  • Football
  • Hurt

• I was convinced in middle school that I invented tight-rolling your pants, because I would get hand-me-downs from my brothers, and of course they were bell-bottoms from the '70s. So I would fold and fold over the bells. I like to think I started the trend. But I didn't.

  

  Patrick Wilson
  • School
  • Think
  • Hand

• A man should be just cultured enough to be able to look with suspicion upon culture at first, not second hand.

  

  Samuel Butler
  • Man
  • Culture
  • Hand

• It takes me a long time writing books. It takes me about five years to write a book, and when I'm done, the last thing I want to do is to do it again.

  

  Naomi Klein
  • Time
  • Long
  • Writing

• Everything that ever happened to me fell in my lap.

  

  Oveta Culp Hobby
  • Me
  • Everything
  • Ever

• Writing books is a nice retreat. There's nothing quite like diving into a book for a few hours. That is a big time vacation.

  

  Padgett Powell
  • Time
  • Writing
  • Book

• It was failing part of my Ph.D. that led me into novel-writing. By then I was 29, had remarried and had a second baby. It struck me that I'd lost my path in life and I felt frustrated. That's when I started to write.

  

  Kate Atkinson
  • Life
  • Writing
  • Lost

• Writing an essay is like a school assignment: I have my topic, I organize my thoughts, and I write it. I have complete control over what I'm doing. Writing a novel is like setting out on a journey without knowing who or what I'll encounter, how long it's going to take, or where I'm going to end up.

  

  Tawni O'Dell
  • Up
  • Long
  • Writing

• Honest criticism, I suppose, has its place. But honest writing is infinitely more valuable.

  

  Rachel Cusk
  • Writing
  • Place
  • Criticism

• Good acting is all in the writing. If it isn't on the page, then it really won't make any difference. You cannot act on force of personality alone.

  

  Larry Hagman
  • Good
  • Writing
  • Alone

• I can ask for a £25,000 advance, but then you spend a year writing the book, and £25,000 is a loan against sales, and you can easily spend five years earning out. So that's £25,000 for six years.

  

  Mal Peet
  • Writing
  • Book
  • Year

• I like collaboration because, first of all, I'm good at writing lyrics. I don't know how to make beats. I don't play instruments. I'm not a good singer. So even when you see a solo album of mine, it's still a collaboration.

  

  Talib Kweli Black Star
  • Good
  • Writing
  • Lyrics

• There's a rule of writing: if everything is funny, nothing is funny; if everything is sad, nothing is sad. You want that contrast.

  

  J. Michael Straczynski
  • Writing
  • Funny
  • Sad

• Movie making is not like other art forms, like painting, or writing a novel, because that can be digested or interpreted... It takes two years to make each one of these, and it's always judged on money.

  

  M. Night Shyamalan
  • Writing
  • Money
  • Art

• Just as invasion is the true and tried weapon in the hands of capital against the class struggle, so on the other hand the fearless pursuit of the class struggle has always proven the most effective preventative of foreign invasions.

  

  Karl Liebknecht
  • True
  • Hand
  • Struggle

• If someone tied me down and made me answer the question, singer, actress, clothing designer, I most likely - it could change on any given day, but mostly likely I would lean towards singing. It's where I feel most like myself - on stage singing.

  

  Mandy Moore
  • Change
  • Question
  • Day

• The top of one mountain is always the bottom of another.

  

  Marianne Williamson
  • Mountain
  • Bottom
  • Top

• Wolf Boy is absolutely beguiling. Evan Kuhlman has boundless empathy for all his characters, and his wonderful protagonist Stephen is, in turn, boundlessly inventive. . . . This is an auspicious debut.

  

  Valerie Sayers
  • Character
  • Boy
  • Boys

• A guy friend and I went to California Pizza Kitchen, and a group of pretty girls came over to us and said, 'You guys are gay, right?'

  

  Chad Michael Murray
  • Guy
  • Pretty
  • Friend

• Because no matter how much money we spend there [in Iraq], as long as the people there see this money as... as assistance that is unwelcome, as long as they continue to be humiliated in their own country by us... I mean, the future looked bleak, and the future after that was in fact very bleak.

  

  Yaroslav Trofimov
  • People
  • Long
  • Country

• 'The Fourth Hand' was a novel that came from twenty years of screenwriting concurrently with whatever novel I'm writing.

  

  John Irving
  • Writing
  • Hand