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John Irving Quotes

Powerful John Irving for Daily Growth

About John Irving

John Irving, an American novelist renowned for his richly textured narrative style, was born on March 2, 1942, in Exeter, New Hampshire. Known for blending humor, tragedy, and a deep exploration of human nature into his work, Irving drew inspiration from his own experiences growing up in New England. Irving's interest in writing began during his teenage years when he worked at a summer camp, where he wrote plays that were performed by the campers. He attended Jackson Prep School and later transferred to Exeter Academy before going on to study creative writing at Harvard University. It was here that he wrote "Setting Free the Bears," his first published work, in 1968. After graduating from Harvard, Irving began teaching high school English, a profession he pursued for several years while continuing to write. His first major novel, "The Hotel New Hampshire" (1981), drew heavily on his experiences at the summer camp and depicted a chaotic, unconventional family that mirrored some aspects of his own upbringing. One of Irving's most acclaimed works, "The World According to Garp" (1978), is a semi-autobiographical novel about a writer named T.S. Garp and his unconventional life. The book explores themes of gender, sexuality, and the nature of family, earning Irving significant critical acclaim. In 1993, Irving released "A Prayer for Owen Meany," a novel that delves into questions of fate and destiny. This work won the National Book Award and cemented Irving's reputation as one of America's greatest contemporary novelists. Today, John Irving continues to write, captivating readers with his unique storytelling and profound insights into the human condition. His works have been translated into over 35 languages, and he has won the National Book Award, the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay (for "The Cider House Rules"), and the National Medal of Arts among other accolades.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"Life is a novel, and each day is a new page."

This quote by John Irving emphasizes the idea that life itself can be viewed as an ongoing narrative, much like a novel. Each day represents a fresh page in this story, offering new experiences, challenges, and opportunities for growth and development. The implication is that we have the power to shape our own destiny, just as a writer shapes the course of a novel's plot. This perspective encourages us to actively engage with life and seize the potential it offers on a daily basis.

"The really incompatible folks usually manage to be together: it's the easy, agreeable couples who part company."

This quote suggests that the most challenging relationships, those with significant differences or disagreements, often persist because they require effort, communication, and compromise. On the other hand, seemingly compatible or agreeable couples may part ways due to a lack of stimulation or challenge in their relationship, causing them to grow apart.

"All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." (This quote is actually from Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, but often associated with John Irving due to his novel, A Widow for One Year.)

This quote suggests that there is a common thread of happiness among families as they generally share similar values, bonds, and experiences. However, each family experiencing unhappiness has unique reasons or circumstances that contribute to their dissatisfaction, making their struggles distinct from one another. In essence, it's easier for us to understand the dynamics within contented families since they operate on universal principles, but understanding the complexities of an unhappy family requires more nuanced analysis because every case is different.

"It was as if life were a work of art, and my mother was the artist."

This quote suggests that the speaker views their mother as the creator or mastermind of their life, much like an artist is the creator of a work of art. It implies a deep appreciation for their mother's role in shaping their experiences, decisions, and the overall trajectory of their life, just as an artist shapes a piece of art to reflect their vision and creativity. The speaker sees their life as a beautiful and purposeful creation, much like a work of art, all due to their mother's influence.

"The really intractable problems are solved by going away and working at them; they aren't solved in conferences or seminars."

This quote by John Irving emphasizes the importance of individual effort, focus, and persistence over collective brainstorming sessions, conferences, or seminars when addressing complex problems. He suggests that true breakthroughs often come from dedicated, focused work on a problem outside the confines of meetings or discussions.

Anybody can do research. The plotting of the novel, writing the ending before you write anything else, which I always do - I don't know that everybody can do that. That's the hard part.

- John Irving

Always, Everybody, Which, Plotting

I think that writers are, at best, outsiders to the society they inhabit. They have a kind of detachment, or try to have.

- John Irving

Society, Think, I Think, Detachment

I grew up without a father, who was kept a mystery to me. There was a sense of uprootedness, things being one day here and the next day not; a sense anything could happen. Then, all of a sudden, my mother met my stepfather, and her life became happier, and my life changed, my name changed.

- John Irving

My Life, Next, Here, Stepfather

I'm not a twentieth-century novelist, I'm not modern, and certainly not postmodern. I follow the form of the nineteenth-century novel; that was the century that produced the models of the form. I'm old-fashioned, a storyteller. I'm not an analyst, and I'm not an intellectual.

- John Irving

Certainly, Models, Postmodern

I don't think I've had a very interesting life, and I feel that is a great liberation. That gives me great freedom as a fiction writer. Nothing that happened holds any special tyranny over me.

- John Irving

Tyranny, Fiction, Very, Liberation

My first attraction to writing novels was the plot, that almost extinct animal. Those novels I read which made me want to be a novelist were long, always plotted, novels - not just Victorian novels, but also those of my New England ancestors: Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne.

- John Irving

Long, Plot, Almost, Attraction

Sigmund Freud was a novelist with a scientific background. He just didn't know he was a novelist. All those damn psychiatrists after him, they didn't know he was a novelist either.

- John Irving

Him, Damn, Scientific, Novelist

One of the humbling things about having written more than one novel is the sense that every time you begin, that new empty page does not know who you are.

- John Irving

New, More, Having, Humbling

I find screenplays easy to write, my novels being very visual. You see what people look like. The physical action is described.

- John Irving

Like, Very, Being, Screenplays

Titles are important; I have them before I have books that belong to them. I have last chapters in my mind before I see first chapters, too. I usually begin with endings, with a sense of aftermath, of dust settling, of epilogue.

- John Irving

Mind, Belong, Last, Titles

With every book, you go back to school. You become a student. You become an investigative reporter. You spend a little time learning what it's like to live in someone else's shoes.

- John Irving

Book, Student, Like, Little Time

I've always preferred writing in longhand. I've always written first drafts in longhand.

- John Irving

Writing, Always, Drafts, Longhand

I don't read anything electronically. I don't write electronically, either - except e-mails to my family and friends. I write in longhand. I have always written first drafts by hand, but I used to write subsequent drafts and insert pages on a typewriter.

- John Irving

Used, I Write, Insert, Longhand

I suppose I'm proudest of my novels for what's imagined in them. I think the world of my imagination is a richer and more interesting place than my personal biography.

- John Irving

Think, More, I Think, Richer

'Great Expectations' was an important novel in my adolescence. It was very much one of those emblematic novels that made me wish I could write like that. It helped that my models as a writer were dead over a hundred years before I began to write.

- John Irving

Before, Very, Hundred, Hundred Years

You don't want to dwell on your enemies, you know. I basically feel so superior to my critics for the simple reason that they haven't done what I do. Most book reviewers haven't written 11 novels. Many of them haven't written one.

- John Irving

Book, Reason, Feel, Novels

I grew up around books - my grandmother's house, where I lived as a small child, was full of books. My father was a history teacher, and he loved the Russian novels. There were always books around.

- John Irving

Small, Always, Russian, Novels

I think there is often a 'what if' proposition that gets me thinking about all my novels.

- John Irving

Think, I Think, About, Novels

When I was still in prep school - 14, 15 - I started keeping notebooks, journals. I started writing, almost like landscape drawing or life drawing. I never kept a diary, I never wrote about my day and what happened to me, but I described things.

- John Irving

Life, About, Almost, Notebooks

It's not very interesting to establish sympathy for people who, on the surface, are instantly sympathetic. I guess I'm always attracted to people who, if their lives were headlines in a newspaper, you might not be very sympathetic about them.

- John Irving

Newspaper, Very, Sympathetic, Establish

Half my life is an act of revision.

- John Irving

My Life, Act, Half, Revision

Good habits are worth being fanatical about.

- John Irving

Habits, About, Being, Fanatical

If you're still wondering about details - how am I going to get these two to meet, or whatever - when you're writing, you can't pay proper attention to the sentences themselves.

- John Irving

Going, Still, Sentences, Wondering

Your memory is a monster; you forget - it doesn't. It simply files things away. It keeps things for you, or hides things from you - and summons them to your recall with a will of its own. You think you have a memory; but it has you!

- John Irving

Memory, Think, Away, Hides

'The Fourth Hand' was a novel that came from twenty years of screenwriting concurrently with whatever novel I'm writing.

- John Irving

Writing, Came, Fourth, Twenty

No adult in my family would ever tell me anything about who my father was. I knew from an older cousin - only four years older than I am - everything, or what little I could discover about him.

- John Irving

Father, Tell, About, Cousin

I think better of our behaviour as individuals than I do when we see ourselves as members of a group. It's when people start forming groups that we have to watch our backs.

- John Irving

Think, I Think, Forming, Group

You don't want to be ungenerous toward people who give you prizes, but it is never the social or political message that interests me in a novel. I begin with an interest in a relationship, a situation, a character.

- John Irving

Want, Give, Social, Prizes

If you presume to love something, you must love the process of it much more than you love the finished product.

- John Irving

Love, Process, Product, Presume

I believe you have constructive accidents en route through a novel only because you have mapped a clear way. If you have confidence that you have a clear direction to take, you always have confidence to explore other ways; if they prove to be mere digressions, you'll recognize that and make the necessary revisions.

- John Irving

Through, Prove, Other, Mapped

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