35 John Irving Quotes for You to Enjoy

John Irving

American Novelist

Born: Mar 2, 1942

Life Me People Think Writing You

Related authors: Elie Wiesel Ernest Hemingway H. P. Lovecraft James Baldwin John Updike Leo Rosten Nathaniel Hawthorne Richard Bach

If you're still wondering about details - how am I going to get these two to meet, or whatever - when you're writing, you can't pay proper attention to the sentences themselves. John Irving

You Writing Whatever Pay Meet Details About Proper Attention How Am Still Get Wondering Going Sentences Themselves Two

I had a particular affinity for wrestling, and it did have a lot to do with being small and being combative - and being angry. And when you're small and you don't back down, you get in a lot of fights. John Irving

Angry You Down Back Small Wrestling Had Combative Particular Lot Affinity Get Did Being Fights

I'm not writing non-fiction. I don't feel anything about me as a kid was unique. Except that I had more interest in being alone and using my imagination. John Irving

Alone Me Writing Imagination Kid About More Except Had Feel Non-Fiction Being Anything Being Alone Interest Unique Using

As many times as I've seen 'The Merchant of Venice,' I always take Shylock's side. For all the hatred that guy is shown, he has a reason to hate in return. He's treated cruelly. And it's tragic that he learns to be intolerant because of what others do to him. John Irving

My first attraction to writing novels was the plot, that almost extinct animal. Those novels I read which made me want to be a novelist were long, always plotted, novels - not just Victorian novels, but also those of my New England ancestors: Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne. John Irving

Me Animal Writing Made Long First Ancestors Those Plot Almost New Also Attraction Read New England Always Were Just Want Which Victorian England Novelist Novels Extinct

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

Writing Whatever Came Years Hand Screenwriting Novel Twenty Fourth

Anybody can do research. The plotting of the novel, writing the ending before you write anything else, which I always do - I don't know that everybody can do that. That's the hard part. John Irving

You Writing Ending Before Research Everybody Else Plotting Write Part Know Always Anybody Anything Anything Else Which Hard Hard Part Novel

John Irving Quotes

No more John Irving quotes