Irwin Shaw Quotes
Quotes to Explore
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Remember that life's big changes rarely give advance warning.
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Writing 'William Shakespeare's Star Wars' was a fun exercise in mixing just the right amount of the Bard with just the right amount of everyone's favorite galaxy far, far away.
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Writing a tribe is fun. They have their own language, their own slang; they repeat it, and it becomes part of the texture of the play. For a writer, that's thrilling. That's when my pen flies.
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I don't have any office; I can write everywhere. So, I put a piece of paper on the table, and then I travel. Literally, writing for me is like travelling. It's getting out of myself and living another life - maybe a better life.
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When you put the pressure on yourself, it's not good. If you fight afraid to lose, you wind up not fighting that good.
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My own writing has perhaps more of an American flavor than a British one, but that's because the stories I've so far written have needed it. 'Empire State,' 'Seven Wonders' and 'The Age Atomic' are all very place-centric, where the setting itself is almost a character. But there is a universality to story that isn't just limited to science fiction.
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Honest criticism, I suppose, has its place. But honest writing is infinitely more valuable.
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Hard writing makes easy reading.
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Commit yourself to a mighty purpose.
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A lot of women seem to think the way to ingratiate themselves is to put down other women or backstab. That's the quickest way to be eliminated from my life - try that with me, and you're out.
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I don't know what you guys say, but at home, life is way different from baseball.
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But you know the thing that I thing oftentimes gets ignored and neglected is there was 10 or 12 years of life before I met Amy and before she met me, where you know, whatever happened was probably going to happen some day.
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He was a sociologist; he had got into an intellectual muddle early on in life and never managed to get out.
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Somebody said to me this morning, 'To what do you attribute your longevity?' I don't know. I mean, I couldn't have planned my life out better. By all accounts I should be dead! The abuse I put my body through: the drugs, the alcohol, the lifestyle I've lived the last 30 years!
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Life is a travelling to the edge of knowledge, then a leap taken.
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The thing that makes writing so difficult is you don't have the element of serendipity. At least with a photograph, you can set up the camera, and something might happen. You might be a lousy photographer, but you can get a good picture if you just take enough of them.
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But I'm trying to play into this role as much as possible and be a nicer person in real life.
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Most seem to think that while a person may not be responsible for the opportunities he gets in life, each is entirely responsible for what he makes of these opportunities.
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The purpose of human life is the dissolution of the soul and the revelation of the Spirit.
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For a long period of history, you were what people said about you, and if your reputation was stained, you were in very serious trouble. People fought duels over this. Then it fades away historically.
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The free market is constantly under attack from those who believe that they know how to make the world a better place with properly administered doses of state coercion.
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No government is here forever. And there are other forces - the most potent force in our society, in fact, big business - doing good for the environment.
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Treaties are like roses and young girls. They last while they last.
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Writing for the theater, you find yourself living a nocturnal life.
