Quotes By Irwin Shaw

Every novelist has a different purpose - and often several purposes which might even be contradictory.

I am forced to say that I have many fiercer critics than myself.

If you're young enough, any kind of writing you do for a short period of time is a marvelous apprenticeship.

All writers are the same - they forget a thousand good reviews and remember one bad one.

I don't think that the writer is regarded as a freak by Americans.

An absolutely necessary part of a writer's equipment, almost as necessary as talent, is the ability to stand up under punishment, both the punishment the world hands out and the punishment he inflicts upon himself.

Isaac Singer was born in Poland and doesn't write in English. Still, he's an American.

In a novel, it's hard to keep track of everybody.

The romantic idea is that everybody around a writer must suffer for his talent. I think a writer is a citizen of humanity, part of his nation, part of his family. He may have to make some compromises.

Special-interest magazines are dangerous places for writers to start out in because the writing quickly falls into a routine and people are likely to find themselves artistically exhausted when they want to work on something of their own.

Kennedy was a man who liked writers and even I got invited to the White House.

A writer is a human being. He has to live with a sense of honor.

My views naturally have mellowed. Most of the critics have been more or less nice to me.

My attitudes have changed, but somebody would have to read all my books to find out how they have.

I imagine that my characters have become much more complicated than when I first began, which would be normal.

I'm not as hopeful as I was when I was young.