John Updike Quotes
Writing criticism is to writing fiction and poetry as hugging the shore is to sailing in the open sea.
Quotes to Explore
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So people think I'm lying about my age all the time? It's the records that are wrong. I've never told anyone how old I am. The minute they ask me, I say 'That's none of your business.' So that means I've never once lied about my age. Now that's true!
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The difference between a violin and a viola is that a viola burns longer.
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In truth, opinion may be taken for understanding; understanding cannot be taken for opinion. How so? Surely because opinion may be deceived; understanding cannot be. If it could, it would not be understanding but opinion. For true understanding has not only certain truth, but the knowledge of truth.
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The environmental movement, like all political processes, reacts best to disasters. But these are very slow, very gradual disasters in the making.
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There are no opportune times for a penalty, and this is not one of those times.
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I know people think that a lot of sports stars are a little bit up themselves, but they all have their heroes, too.
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I love people who break boundaries and always create something new and fresh.
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It's a great feat for me to have broken my world record.
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I loathe bad theater and most theatre is very bad because it's repetitious, unexciting and, dangerously, it is sometimes praised for those things.
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The very idea of marriage is basic to recognition as equals in our society; any status short of that is inferior, unjust, and unconstitutional.
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Anti-religious sneers are a hallmark of perpetual adolescents.
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Acting is something that I always wanted, but I never paid attention to the notion that it might actually work out. You have all sorts of ideas about what you want to do - at one stage, I wanted to be a jockey - but this is the one that's a big deal.
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The University of South Carolina has always played a role in my life and the intellectual life of South Carolina.
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'Wicked' gave us a story that 'The Wizard of Oz' did not. Two sides to every story.
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Personal responsibility is not only recognizing the errors of our ways. Personal responsibility lies in our willingness and ability to correct those errors individually and collectively.
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I am the luckiest novelist in the world. I was a first-time novelist who wasn't awash in rejection slips, whose manuscript didn't disappear in slush piles. I have had a wonderful time.
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Whenever I write a new song, it always happens when I come back from Europe or Egypt or something like that. It's always from travelling.
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If I had been straight, I would have been an entirely different person. I would never have turned toward writing with a burning desire to confess, to understand, to justify myself in the eyes of others... I wouldn't have been impelled to live in New York and choose the hard poverty of bohemia over the soft comfort of the business world.
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ISIS is very similar to the Kharijites, who were a toxic off-shoot of Islam. It's not Islam; it's a perversion of Islam, and to label these militant externalities as Islam is to legitimize their actions.
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Over the last decade, economists seemed to share a broad consensus about economic policy, with the old splits between monetarists and Keynesians apparently being settled by events. But the Great Recession of the last two years has changed everything.
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No authentic Messiah would inspire a religion that ended up calling upon the Jews to reject the manifest meaning of Sinai. It is really that simple.
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One of the things my friends would tell you is that I hang out with a lot of non-writers - just regular people like bankers and teachers, and I actually try to steer our talk away from my work when I get together with them.
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Writing criticism is to writing fiction and poetry as hugging the shore is to sailing in the open sea.
