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It doesn’t really matter who said it – it’s so obviously true. Before you can write anything, you have to notice something.

John Irving

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
We permit bad taste in this country. In fact, we even encourage it – and reward it in all manner of ways.
JOHN IRVING

Country Rewards Way
If you asked me one day, I might say, “Well, sometimes I feel a little bit religious.” If you asked me another day, I’d just say flat out, “No.”
JOHN IRVING

Another Day Religious
I’ve always been slow but I’m even slower now. I’m more into the waiting, or I guess I’m more patient about the waiting.
JOHN IRVING

Change More Patient Waiting
but writers, Garp knew, were just observers – good and ruthless imitators of human behavior.
JOHN IRVING

Behavior Humans Ruthless
What is hardest to accept about the passage of time is that the people who once mattered the most to us wind up in parentheses.
JOHN IRVING

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

Asking Giving Please
Nearly everything seems a letdown after a writer has finished writing something.
JOHN IRVING

Scary Writing
I’m not afraid, but I’m very nervous.
JOHN IRVING

Nervous Not Afraid People
The way you define yourself as a writer is that you write every time you have a free minute. If you didn’t behave that way you would never do anything.
JOHN IRVING

Minutes Way Writing
So, I don’t work in terms of real time. I don’t work in a timely fashion.
JOHN IRVING

Fashion Real Term Work
My life is a reading list.
JOHN IRVING

Life Lists Reading
Whereas she wished more of the population were better educated, she also believed that education was largely wasted on the majority of the people she met.
JOHN IRVING

Majority People Population
It is hard work and great art to make life not so serious.
JOHN IRVING

Art Hard Work Serious
Watch out for people who call themselves religious; make sure you know what they mean – make sure they know what they mean!
JOHN IRVING

Mean People Religious

It doesn’t really matter who said it – it’s so obviously true. Before you can write anything, you have to notice something.

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It doesn’t really matter who said it – it’s so obviously true. Before you can write anything, you have to notice something.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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