black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

I write very quickly; I rewrite very slowly. It takes me nearly as long to rewrite a book as it does to get the first draft.

John Irving

A writer’s job is to imagine everything so personally that the fiction is as vivid as memories.
JOHN IRVING

Jobs Memories Writing
but writers, Garp knew, were just observers – good and ruthless imitators of human behavior.
JOHN IRVING

Behavior Humans Ruthless
My life is a reading list.
JOHN IRVING

Life Lists Reading
In the world according to Garp, we are all terminal cases
JOHN IRVING

Cases Meany Owen World
They were involved in that awkward procedure of getting to unknow each other.
JOHN IRVING

Awkward Procedures Regret
Life forces enough final decisions on us. We should have the sense to avoid as many of the unnecessary ones as we can.
JOHN IRVING

Decision Finals Unnecessarily
Maybe television causes cancer, Garp thinks; but his real irritation is a writer’s irritation: he knows that wherever the TV glows, there sits someone who isn’t reading.
JOHN IRVING

Cancer Reading Real
You can’t learn everything you need to know legally.
JOHN IRVING

Feet Knows Needs
It’s not right to hurt or deceive someone who’s already been hurt and deceived.
JOHN IRVING

Deceived Deceiving Hurt
The powerful wind swept his hair away from his face; he leaned his chest into the wind, as if he stood on the deck of a ship heading into the wind, slicing through the waves of an ocean he’d not yet seen.
JOHN IRVING

Hair Ocean Powerful
As it was, things went from bad to worse, as they often will when amateurs are involved in an activity that they perform in bad temper – or in a hurry.
JOHN IRVING

Activity Bad Temper
I don’t begin a novel until I have written, not just the last sentence, but usually, as a result thereof, many of the surrounding final paragraphs, so that in addition to knowing what happens, I know what the voice is.
JOHN IRVING

Finals Knowing Usually Voice
And when you love a book, commit one glorious sentence of it-perhaps your favorite sentence-to memory. That way you won’t forget the language of the story that moved you to tears.
JOHN IRVING

Book Memories Tears
The excitement of anticipation was *almost* equal to the thrill of lovemaking.
JOHN IRVING

Anticipation Excitement Thrill
Plot is a map and I begin with it. It is what made me admire the novels of the 19th century; that the stories are foreshadowed. TheyÕre going someplace.
JOHN IRVING

Creative Maps Writing
I suppose I’m proudest of my novels for what’s imagined in them. I think the world of my imagination is a richer and more interesting place than my personal biography.
JOHN IRVING

Imagination Interesting Thinking

I write very quickly; I rewrite very slowly. It takes me nearly as long to rewrite a book as it does to get the first draft.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

I write very quickly; I rewrite very slowly. It takes me nearly as long to rewrite a book as it does to get the first draft.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More John Irving Quotes