but writers, Garp knew, were just observers – good and ruthless imitators of human behavior.
JOHN IRVINGbut writers, Garp knew, were just observers – good and ruthless imitators of human behavior.
JOHN IRVINGYou’re nice,’ Cushie told him, squeezing his hand. ‘And you’re my oldest friend.’ But they both must have known that you can know someone all your life and never quite be friends.
JOHN IRVINGIf we live long enough, we become caricatures of ourselves.
JOHN IRVINGHow we love to love things for other people; how we love to have other people love things through our eyes.
JOHN IRVINGI grew up in a family where, through my teenage years, I was expected to go to church on Sunday. It wasn’t terribly painful.
JOHN IRVINGI have always believed that, in a story, if something traumatic or calamitous enough happens to a kid at a formative age, that will make him or her the adult they become.
JOHN IRVINGI 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 IRVINGThere are always suicides among people who are unable to say what they mean.
JOHN IRVINGThis is what self-centered religion does to us: it allows us to use it to further our own ends.
JOHN IRVINGThere is no straightforward negotiation with a four year old.
JOHN IRVINGI always thought that you could do worse than find yourself dying in the company of a devoted former student.
JOHN IRVINGDeath, it seems,” Garp wrote, “does not like to wait until we are prepared for it. Death is indulgent and enjoys, when it can, a flair for the dramatic.
JOHN IRVINGIf you presume to love something, you must love the process of it much more than you love the finished product.
JOHN IRVINGHe wished he could arrange a maiming as a kind of moral lesson
JOHN IRVINGWhen Jack Burns needed to hold his mother’s hand, his fingers could see in the dark.
JOHN IRVINGSo, I don’t work in terms of real time. I don’t work in a timely fashion.
JOHN IRVING