I had been a student in Vienna, and one of the neat little things I had found out was about that zoo.… — John Irving Copy Share Image
Life," Garp wrote, "is sadly not structured like a good old-fashioned novel. Instead an end occurs when those who are meant to… — John Irving Copy Share Image
For most of my life, when I've finished the book I'm writing, there've always been as many as two or three other… — John Irving Copy Share Image
If I have any advantage, maybe, as a writer, it is that I don't think I'm very interesting. I mean, beginning a… — John Irving Copy Share Image
The characters in my novels, from the very first one, are always on some quixotic effort of attempting to control something that… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I don't begin a novel until I have written, not just the last sentence, but usually, as a result thereof, many of… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I believe that, in any novel of mine, the principal objective is the construction of the whole. — John Irving Copy Share Image
You don't want to be ungenerous toward people who give you prizes, but it is never the social or political message that… — John Irving Copy Share Image
A novel is a piece of architecture. It's not random wallowings or confessional diaries. It's a building-it has to have walls and… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I never know when I finish the novel I am writing which will be the next novel out of the station. — John Irving Copy Share Image
In an episodic treatment, such as a teleplay is, you have the ability to do what you can do in a novel,… — John Irving Copy Share Image
When I love a novel I've read, I want to reread it - in part, to see how it was constructed. — John Irving Copy Share Image
The concept of writing a novel and not knowing where it's going - I don't know how to do that. Novels are… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I'm not a twentieth-century novelist, I'm not modern, and certainly not postmodern. I follow the form of the nineteenth-century novel; that was… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I'm a very old-fashioned novelist. I write 19th-century novels, where a lot of rules apply. — John Irving Copy Share Image
The building of the architecture of a novel - the craft of it - is something I never tire of. — John Irving Copy Share Image
Anybody can do research. The plotting of the novel, writing the ending before you write anything else, which I always do -… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I suppose I'm proudest of my novels for what's imagined in them. I think the world of my imagination is a richer… — John Irving Copy Share Image
'Great Expectations' was an important novel in my adolescence. It was very much one of those emblematic novels that made me wish… — John Irving Copy Share Image
'The Fourth Hand' was a novel that came from twenty years of screenwriting concurrently with whatever novel I'm writing. — John Irving Copy Share Image
I have a process that I seem to always, to some degree, as a writer, adhere to, but I certainly have never… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I believe a novel should be as complicated and involved as you're capable of making it. — John Irving Copy Share Image
There's a lot of ignorance about how long it takes to write a novel. There's a lot of ignorance about how long… — John Irving Copy Share Image
Your memory is a monster; you forget - it doesn't. It simply files things away. It keeps things for you, or hides things from… — John Irving Copy Share Image
… and so he tried to accept the ache in his heart as what Dr. Larch would call the common symptoms of normal life. — John Irving Copy Share Image
Watch out for people who call themselves religious; make sure you know what they mean––make sure they know what they mean! — John Irving Copy Share Image
The desire to never leave your side, the desire to never see you again. The desire to see your face asleep on the pillow… — John Irving Copy Share Image
I had been a student in Vienna, and one of the neat little things I had found out was about that zoo. It was… — John Irving Copy Share Image
“God, I think I just hit a high E-flat - and I really held it!" Esmeralda said, after one of her more prolonged orgasms,… — John Irving Copy Share Image
“Nostalgia!" Miss Frost cried. "You´re nostalgic!" She repeated. "Just how old are you, William?" She asked. "Seventeen, " I told her. "Seventeen!" Miss Frost… — John Irving Copy Share Image
“JUST BECAUSE A BUNCH OF ATHEISTS ARE BETTER WRITERS THAN THE GUYS WHO WROTE THE BIBLE DOESN'T NECESSARILY MAKE THEM RIGHT!" [Owen Meany] said… — John Irving Copy Share Image
It is much easier to be flexible about where a story begins than it ever was for me to change my mind about where… — John Irving Copy Share Image
“Only the chicken-lover will understand me. He will give me a kindly look, maybe mildly desirous. His eyes will tell me: You might look… — John Irving Copy Share Image
You'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… — John Irving Copy Share Image
