Writing Quotes by Martin Amis

I say the sentences again and again in my head until they sound right.

— Martin Amis

Someone watches over us when we write. Mother. Teacher. Shakespeare. God.

— Martin Amis

I would never write about someone that forced me to write at a lower register than what I can write,

— Martin Amis

I always do my draft in long hand because even the ink is part of the flow.

— Martin Amis

You can't sort of write the novel as if you're taking dictation from heaven.

— Martin Amis

I think all writers have a bit of genius in them, and a bit of talent. Genius retreats but talent improves.

— Martin Amis

Often it doesn't occur to you what kind of novel you're writing until quite late on.

— Martin Amis

Most writers need a wound, either physical or spiritual.

— Martin Amis

You can't be up the reader's ass, as many a writer I think is - cute as hell, ingratiating as hell. But…

— Martin Amis

This (writing) is the love of your life. It's what I want to do when I wake up. Nothing feels so absorbing,…

— Martin Amis

Probably all writers are at some point briefly under the impression that they are in the forefront of disintegration and chaos, that…

— Martin Amis

Deciding to write a novel about something - as opposed to finding you are writing a novel around something - sounds to…

— Martin Amis

Every writer hopes or boldly assumes that his life is in some sense exemplary, that the particular will turn out to be…

— Martin Amis

The only writer who gives me unfeigned pleasure is P.G. Wodehouse. And even him I find a bit heavy. He takes a…

— Martin Amis

All novelists write in a different way, but I always write in longhand and then do two versions of typescript on a…

— Martin Amis

America has had much more respect for its writers because they had to define what America was. America wasn't sure what it…

— Martin Amis

It's been said that happiness writes white. It doesn't show up on the page. When you're on holiday and writing a letter…

— Martin Amis

It's becoming clearer and clearer to me that the world is there to be celebrated by writers, and in fact this is…

— Martin Amis

“It takes three or four years before the present day sinks in to you as a novelist. It has not just to…

— Martin Amis

When I hear about some sensational new writer I sort of think, Shut up ... you've got to be around for a…

— Martin Amis

“In general, writers never find out how strong their talent is: that investigation begins with their obituaries. In the USSR, writers found…

— Martin Amis

Several people, not just reviewers, took me to task for writing about what they called the working classes - something I've been…

— Martin Amis

When I talk about the pleasure principle, I don't say there is only one kind of pleasure, there are many kinds of…

— Martin Amis

The process of writing a novel is getting to know more about the novel until you know everything about it. And it's…

— Martin Amis

“...I think one shouldn't pussyfoot, and just say that you write the stuff that you would like to read. So you write…

— Martin Amis

“Literature...describes a descent. First, gods. Then demigods. Then epic became tragedy: failed kings, failed heroes. Then the gentry. Then the middle class…

— Martin Amis

“A writer’s life is half ambition and half anxiety, and there has to be both. It is no good writing a novel…

— Martin Amis

You never can tell, though, with suicide notes, can you? In the planetary aggregate of all life, there are many more suicide…

— Martin Amis

It's interesting when you're doing signing sessions with other writers and you look at the queues at each table and you can…

— Martin Amis

What did Nabokov and Joyce have in common, apart from the poor teeth and the great prose? Exile, and decades of near…

— Martin Amis

“He frowned. She laughed. He brightened. She pouted. He grinned. She flinched. Come on: we don’t do that. Except when we’re pretending.…

— Martin Amis

Seeing the world anew, as if it were new, is as old as writing. It's what all painters are trying to do,…

— Martin Amis

I think writers are excited by stupidity and bad behavior, generally.

— Martin Amis

Don't dumb down; always write for your top five percent of readers.

— Martin Amis

There's a lot of anti-intellectualism in Britain. And the writer's views on this or that are really of less importance, as they…

— Martin Amis

“The easier a thing is to write then the more the writer gets paid for writing it. (And vice versa: ask the…

— Martin Amis

To idealize: all writing is a campaign against cliché. Not just clichés of the pen but clichés of the mind and clichés…

— Martin Amis

The literary interview won't tell you what a writer is like. Far more compellingly to some, it will tell you what a…

— Martin Amis

What did Nabokov and Joyce have in common, apart from the poor teeth and the great prose? Exile, and decades of near…

— Martin Amis

All writers of fiction will at some point find themselves abandoning a piece of work - or find themselves putting it aside,…

— Martin Amis