Books Quote by W. Somerset Maugham

First of all, the novel should be a critique of the novels that have come before it in a language that broadens the audience…

— Kiese Laymon

I don't think everyone wants to create the great American novel, but we all have a dream of telling our stories-of realizing what we…

— Natalie Goldberg

I really feel the novel has certain conveniences about it and has something so fundamental about it you could almost say that as long…

— William Golding

Since I cant write the greatest American novel, Im going to write the longest American novel.

— Thomas Steinbeck

I've had a lot of books rejected in my time. My first novel, which didn't get published, was, with hindsight, crashingly dull.

— Helen Fielding

“The novel has been the subject of several scholarly essays and has become a staple of college classes in contemporary fiction (and even the…

— David Markson

The novel doesn't come into existence until certain methods of reproducing fiction come along.

— Leslie Fiedler

A masterpiece of fiction is an original world and as such is not likely to fit the world of the reader.

— Vladimir Nabokov

Since I can't write the greatest American novel, I'm going to write the longest American novel.

— Thomas Steinbeck

I'm skeptical that the novel will be 're-invented.'

— Jeff Bezos

“Henry James said there isn't any difference between "the English novel" and "the American novel" since there are only two kinds of novels at…

— Eudora Welty

It can be hard to write a skillfully entertaining fiction, but a great book wants to be more, and wants more from us.

— Guy Gavriel Kay