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The building of the architecture of a novel – the craft of it – is something I never tire of.

John Irving

O God — please give him back! I shall keep asking You.
JOHN IRVING

Asking Giving Please
When I finally write the first sentence, I want to know everything that happens, so that I am not inventing the story as I write it – rather, I am remembering a story that has already happened.
JOHN IRVING

Stories Want Writing
There’s no reason you shouldn’t, as a writer, not be aware of the necessity to revise yourself constantly.
JOHN IRVING

Aware Constantly Reason
I certainly think Obama is the most hopeful president I’ve seen in the country since John Kennedy.
JOHN IRVING

Country Hopeful Thinking
Life is an X-rated soap opera.
JOHN IRVING

Life Opera Soap
I have no respect for the right-to-life position, though I have every respect for an individual who says, “I could never have that procedure, I could never see a film or read a book about that procedure.” It doesn’t bother me if people feel that way.
JOHN IRVING

Book People Procedure Way
Just when you begin thinking of yourself as memorable, you run into someone who can’t even remember having met you
JOHN IRVING

Memorable Running Thinking
My brain is sending poison to my heart.
JOHN IRVING

Brain Heart Poison
You don’t want to be ungenerous toward people who give you prizes, but it is never the social or political message that interests me in a novel. I begin with an interest in a relationship, a situation, a character.
JOHN IRVING

Character Giving People
Self-hatred is worse than loneliness.
JOHN IRVING

Hatred Loneliness Self
Nearly everything seems a letdown after a writer has finished writing something.
JOHN IRVING

Scary Writing
Writing a novel is actually searching for victims. As I write I keep looking for casualties. The stories uncover the casualties.
JOHN IRVING

Stories Victim Writing
You can’t say you’re going to ban something in the name of good taste, because then you have directed someone to play the role of good-taste police. We – Americans – permit bad taste in this country. In fact, we even encourage it.
JOHN IRVING

Country Names Play
You know, everybody dies. My parents died. Your father died. Everybody dies. I’m going to die too. So will you. The thing is, to have a life before we die. It can be a real adventure having a life
JOHN IRVING

Adventure Everybody Father Real
I think now that is the nature of hymns-they make us want to repeat them…they are a part of any service, and often the only part of a funeral service, that makes us feel everything is acceptable.
JOHN IRVING

Funeral Hymns Thinking
But I often think that so-called glamorous people are just very busy people.
JOHN IRVING

Busy People Thinking

The building of the architecture of a novel – the craft of it – is something I never tire of.

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The building of the architecture of a novel – the craft of it – is something I never tire of.

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Popular Authors

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