The liveliest effusions of wit and humour are simply what the reader of a novel has a right to expect. — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
A novel is not a play. A novel takes one reader at a time into its confidence. It can be shockingly personal.… — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
Let discernment in matters of fashion and entertainment determine who should get the vote, and half the country would be disenfranchised. — Howard Jacobson Country Copy Share Image
One of the great things about us Jews is that we tell the best jokes. Part of the reason is we tell… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
You know you are grown sentimental when you start counting the cygnets on the duck pond in the park to be sure… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
Not every anti-Semite is Joseph Goebbels. You can not like Jews much and be no great harm to them. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
It's a law of our natures, especially when the political fit is on us, to applaud where we already approve, and deride… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
The Stop The War Coalition is a sort of home to Jew-haters because its hate music about Israel is so catchy. — Howard Jacobson Hate Copy Share Image
It isn't only in the name of free speech that the views of an itchy polemicist should be tolerated - and I… — Howard Jacobson Communication Copy Share Image
Trawl through the world of blogs and tweets, and you will find readers complaining when they stumble upon a word they don't… — Howard Jacobson Attitude Copy Share Image
Literature more often tells the story of impulses we don't act on than of ones we do. I could joke about the… — Howard Jacobson Anxious Copy Share Image
I should have conceived the idea for 'The Mighty Walzer' earlier. A boy who dreamed of winning fame, fortune, and the adoration… — Howard Jacobson Beautiful Copy Share Image
Of my old tendency to overdo the dedication and deface the title page with florid compliments and obscure quotes which the recipient… — Howard Jacobson Dedication Copy Share Image
I once gave a character in a novel my inability to get past the same point in any work of philosophy: that… — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
To any young person starting out on life and looking to make a quick fortune, I have this advice: forget banking, but… — Howard Jacobson Advice Copy Share Image
How do you go on knowing that you will never again - not ever, ever - see the person you have loved?… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
I've always felt that desire. To get a woman to throw back her head in laughter is a hot thing. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
“But what is the imagination for if not tto grasp how the world feels to those who don't think what you think?” — Howard Jacobson Imagination Copy Share Image
Let's be honest with one another: almost everything is too long except life, and I know people who wouldn't even concur with… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
As a young man, I wooed, unsuccessfully, with Puccini. It's important to get your operas right. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
Many a trivial novel has been written about an important subject, and many a profound one about nothing in particular. — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
The young come in many guises: vigorous and passionate, vindictive and mean-spirited. And not every person over 65 is dozing in a… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
Show me a novel that's not comic, and I'll show you a novel that's not doing its job. — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
Maybe we'd forgotten what socialists are meant to look and sound like. Well, now we've been reminded. They're meant to look and… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
The 'Reader's Digest' used to run a feature called 'It Pays to Increase Your Word Power.' The new wisdom - post-Trump and… — Howard Jacobson Brexit Copy Share Image
To a philosopher like Nietzsche, the Jew is culpable not for rejecting Christianity but for inventing it. — Howard Jacobson Christianity Copy Share Image
The environment in which I studied was so safe, I thought I would die from the boredom of it. — Howard Jacobson Boredom Copy Share Image
The girls pick snouts from the pack as though they're chocolates and it matters which they select. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
“So the mathematician and the artist are companioned in the same dark, and do obeisance to the same gods.” — Howard Jacobson Art Copy Share Image
There mustn't be a moment when we turn on the TV and think, 'There's Trump in the White House' - that must… — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
A writer should never allow himself to be lulled out of the vigilance native to his profession. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
I normally take a long time finding titles. I finish the book and go into sweats for months afterwards trying to think… — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
If something or someone is being banned, I want to be among the first to know about it. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
Everything is allowable in literature, but what is not allowable in criticism is objection on the grounds of probability. — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
Artless fairy stories enchant us in our first years and retain their hold on us until our last. — Howard Jacobson Fairy Copy Share Image
It's always nice to be praised, and insofar as a prize is a form of praise, you're glad when you get it. — Howard Jacobson Copy Share Image
All those words of praise they use for novels - spare, economical. Why should I shell out £17 for economical? — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
Passionate dissent from the will of the multitude should be respected, not derided. — Howard Jacobson Dissent Copy Share Image
Many a woman has suffered at the hands of a Paul Morel. There's more than one way of being brutal. — Howard Jacobson Being Copy Share Image
Imagine the anticlimax of opening a novel you'd just got Dostoyevsky to sign and finding 'Keep smiling - Fyodor.' — Howard Jacobson Books Copy Share Image
