Books Quotes by Edward Abbey

Books are like eggs -- best when fresh.

— Edward Abbey

The author: an imaginary person who writes real books.

— Edward Abbey

Most new books drop immediately into the oblivion they so richly deserve.

— Edward Abbey

Readers, not critics, are the people who determine a book's eventual fate.

— Edward Abbey

A critic is to an author as a fungus to an oak.

— Edward Abbey

“But hell, I do like to write letters. Much easier than writing books.”

— Edward Abbey

The best thing about graduating from the university was that I finally had time to sit on a log and read a…

— Edward Abbey

It is always dishonest for a reviewer to review the author instead of the author's book.

— Edward Abbey

There are only two kinds of books -- good books and the others. The good are winnowed from the bad through the…

— Edward Abbey

How long does it take to write a good book? All of the years that you've lived.

— Edward Abbey

My own best books have not been published. In fact, they've not even been written yet.

— Edward Abbey

“I think it is far more important to save one square mile of wilderness, anywhere, by any means, than to produce another…

— Edward Abbey

I've never yet read a review of one of my own books that I couldn't have written much better myself.

— Edward Abbey

I always wanted to be a cowboy. But alas! I was burdened early with certain inescapable obligations to world literature.

— Edward Abbey

“People who think that love, sex, marriage, work, play, life and death are serious matters are urged NOT to read this book.…

— Edward Abbey

Too many American authors have a servile streak where their backbone should be. Where's our latest Nobel laureate? More than likely you'll…

— Edward Abbey

Most of what we call the classics of world literature suggest artifacts in a wax museum. We have to hire and pay…

— Edward Abbey

My sole literary ambition is to write one good novel, then retire to my hut in the desert, assume the lotus position,…

— Edward Abbey

“Certainly, I want to capture the reader's attention from the beginning and hold it until the end: that is half the purpose…

— Edward Abbey

“I might also say, regarding reviews and reviewers, that I have yet to read a review of any of my own books…

— Edward Abbey

There comes a time in the life of us all when we must lay aside our books or put down our tools…

— Edward Abbey

Man's deliberate destruction of his own habitat -- planet Earth -- could serve as a mighty theme for a mighty book worthy…

— Edward Abbey

We are befouling and destroying our own home, we are committing a slow but accelerating race suicide and life murder - planetary…

— Edward Abbey

Why can't we simply borrow what is useful to us from Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, especially Zen, as we borrow from Christianity, science,…

— Edward Abbey

Music endures and ages far better than books. Books, made of words, are unavoidably attached to ideas, events, conflict, and history, but…

— Edward Abbey

The majority of American writers today have chosen passive non-resistance to things as they are, producing sloughs of poetry about their personal…

— Edward Abbey

“What I am really writing about, what I have always written about, is the idea of human freedom, human community, the real…

— Edward Abbey

“A writer must be hard to live with: when not working he is miserable, and when he is working he is obsessed.…

— Edward Abbey

“The novel should tell the truth, as I see the truth, or as the novelist persuades me to see it. And one…

— Edward Abbey

Ah yes, the head is full of books. The hard part is to force them down through the bloodstream and out through…

— Edward Abbey

It is an author's most solemn obligation to honor truth. If the free and independent writer does not speak truth to power,…

— Edward Abbey

My notion of a great novel is something like a five-hundred-page shaggy-dog story, with only the punch line omitted.

— Edward Abbey

I would like to evoke the sense of wonder and magic in the reader but without invoking the mystical, the supernatural or…

— Edward Abbey

The response to my books from my East Coast friends has been wildly various, running the gamut from 'bad' to 'very bad.'…

— Edward Abbey

The ideal kitchen-sink novel: Throw in everything but the kitchen sink. Then add the kitchen sink.

— Edward Abbey

There comes a point, in literary objectivity, when the author's self- effacement is hard to distinguish from moral cowardice.

— Edward Abbey

A good book is a kind of paper club, serving to rouse the slumbrous and to silence the obtuse.

— Edward Abbey

My books always make the best-seller lists in Wolf Hole, Arizona, and Hanksville, Utah.

— Edward Abbey

In order to write a book, it is necessary to sit down (or stand up) and write. Therein lies the difficulty.

— Edward Abbey

Jane Austen: Getting into her books is like getting in bed with a cadaver. Something vital is lacking; namely, life.

— Edward Abbey