Philip Roth Quotes - Page 7

Quotes about:

• A Jew without Jews, without Judaism, without Zionism, without Jewishness, without a temple or an army or even a pistol, a Jew clearly without a home, just the object itself, like a glass or an apple.

  Philip Roth

  Home, Army, Glasses

  Philip Roth, Ross Miller (2008). “Novels & other narratives, 1986-1991”

  9 Copy quote

• A writer has to be driven crazy to help him to see. A writer needs his poisons.

  Philip Roth

  Crazy, Poison, Needs

  Philip Roth, George John Searles (1992). “Conversations with Philip Roth”, p.180, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• I do not say correct or savory. I do not say seemly or even natural. I say serious. Sensationally serious. Unspeakably serious. Solemnly, recklessly, blissfully serious.

  Philip Roth

  Serious, Natural, Savory

  Philip Roth (1995). “Sabbath's Theater”, p.458, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• He is not simply looking into the mirror because he is transfixed by what he sees. Rather, the artist’s success depends as much as anything on his powers of detachment, on de-narcissizing himself… Freud… studied his own dreams not because he was a “narcissist,” but because he was a student of dreams. And whose were at once the least and most accessible of dreams, if not his own?

  Philip Roth

  Dream, Artist, Mirrors

  "My Life As A Man". Book by Philip Roth, December 23, 2010.

  4 Copy quote

• I haven't written a word of fiction since 2009. I have no desire to write fiction. I did what I did and it's done. There's more to life than writing and publishing fiction. There is another way entirely, amazed as I am to discover it at this late date.

  Philip Roth

  Writing, Desire, Fiction

  "'The Novelist's Obsession Is With Language': Philip Roth on Writing, the Future of Language and the Ghost Writer". Interview with Cynthia Haven, news.stanford.edu. February 03, 2014.

  4 Copy quote

• In my childhood I led the life of a sage, when I grew up I started climbing trees

  Philip Roth

  Climbing, Childhood, Tree

  Philip Roth (2007). “Zuckerman Bound: A Trilogy and Epilogue 1979-1985”

  5 Copy quote

• You take off your clothes and you're in bed with somebody, and that is indeed where whatever you've concealed, your particularity, whatever it may be, however encrypted, is going to be found out, and that's what all the shyness is all about and what everybody fears.

  Philip Roth

  Clothes, Bed, May

  Philip Roth (2000). “The Human Stain: A Novel”, p.113, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• What I would really love to happen to me would be if I came upon an idea that would keep me busy until I die so I wouldn't have to go through the business of thinking up a new book. But I wouldn't mind writing a long book which is going to occupy me for the rest of my life.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

  4 Copy quote

• I work most days and if you work most days and you get at least a page done a day, then at the end of the year you have 365. So the pages accumulate and then I publish the books.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Years, Done

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

  6 Copy quote

• I'm an Obama supporter. And if you're an Obama supporter that means you had a hard time during the Bush years.

  Philip Roth

  Mean, Hard Times, Years

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

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• 'Haunted by the past' is a commonplace phrase because it's a commonplace experience. Even if one is not, strictly speaking, 'haunted', the past is perpetually with one in the present, and the longer it grows and the further it recedes the stronger its presence seems to become.

  Philip Roth

  Past, Stronger, Phrases

  Source: www.theguardian.com

  4 Copy quote

• The book really comes to life in the rewriting.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Rewriting

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

  6 Copy quote

• When I have a first draft, I have a floor under my feet that I can walk on. And then, especially with the help of the computer, rewriting is so easy to do with the computer, much easier than it used to be with the typewriter. So the books go through numerous drafts.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Typewriters, Feet

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

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• I think I write or publish as much as I do because I can bear being without a book to work on.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

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• The book can't compete with the screen. It couldn't compete beginning with the movie screen. It couldn't compete with the television screen and it can't compete with the computer screen I don't think. And now we have all those screens so against all those screens I think the book can't measure up.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Thinking, Television

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

  4 Copy quote

• Each book starts from ashes really. I don't feel that I have this to say or that to say or this story to tell or that story to tell, but I want to be occupied with the writing process while I'm living.

  Philip Roth

  Book, Writing, Ashes

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

  4 Copy quote

• To read a novel requires a certain kind of concentration, focus, devotion to the reading. If you read a novel in more than two weeks, you don't read the novel really.

  Philip Roth

  Reading, Two, Focus

  Source: www.thedailybeast.com

  5 Copy quote

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