Harry Crews

Alcohol whipped me. Alcohol and I had many, many marvelous times together. We laughed, we talked, we danced at the party together;…

— Harry Crews

I've never enjoyed myself. I'm incapable of enjoying myself. There's just some people who don't enjoy themselves very much.

— Harry Crews

If you wait until you got time to write a novel, or time to write a story, or time to read the…

— Harry Crews

Teaching, real teaching, is - or ought to be - a messy business.

— Harry Crews

The writer's job is to get naked...

— Harry Crews

Men to whom God is dead worship one another.

— Harry Crews

There ought to be a law against the sun rising and setting for you in somebody else.

— Harry Crews

“If you love something/Set it free/If it loves you/It will come back to you/ If it doesn't--hunt it down and kill it.”

— Harry Crews

That was the only decision there was once upon a time: what to do with the night.

— Harry Crews

“everybody he knew was going quietly mad from being tied on a leash that was too short.”

— Harry Crews

“Survival is truimph enough.”

— Harry Crews

“She felt the snake between her breasts, felt him there, and loved him there, coiled, the deep tumescent S held rigid, ready…

— Harry Crews

I am not perfect." It came out in a rush of breath. "See I thought I was. Thank God I ain't. See…

— Harry Crews

Writing a book is like torture that you don't know, but after it's done and there it is. It's a joy like…

— Harry Crews

Survival is triumph enough.

— Harry Crews

Hell came right along with God, hand in hand. The stink of sulfur swirled in the air of the church, fire burned…

— Harry Crews

“She felt the snake between her breasts, felt him there, and loved him there, coiled, the deep tumescent S held rigid, ready…

— Harry Crews

I think all of us are looking for that which does not admit of bullshit . . . If you tell me…

— Harry Crews

The artist lives in an atmosphere of perpetual failure.

— Harry Crews

The truth of the matter was stories was everything and everything was stories. Everybody told stories. It was a way of saying…

— Harry Crews

“White people were dangerous and snakes were dangerous and now the two were working together, each doing what the other told it…

— Harry Crews

I first became fascinated with the Sears catalogue because all the people in its pages were perfect. Nearly everybody I knew had…

— Harry Crews

If you're gonna write, for God in heaven's sake, try to get naked. Try to write the truth. Try to get underneath…

— Harry Crews

I never wanted to be well-rounded. I do not admire well-rounded people nor their work. So far as I can see, nothing…

— Harry Crews

Writers spend all their time preoccupied with just the things that their fellow men and women spend their time trying to avoid…

— Harry Crews