Quotes from John Irving

Emma Oastler had made Jack's future her business

Quite understandably, as a Jew, Noah felt that German was the language of his people's executioners and he refused to learn a word of it.)

won't they?

WHY SHOULD SOMEONE WHO'S GOT SUCH A WORKED-OUT WAY OF SEEING THE WORLD BORE YOU? WHY SHOULDN'T YOU BE INTERESTED IN SOMEONE WHO'S WORKED OUT A WAY TO SEE THE WORLD? THAT'S WHAT MAKES WRITERS INTERESTING!

She told all the would-be biographers, exactly as he would have, "Read the work. Forget the life.

Jack had not only heard Billy Crystal's joke; he was genuinely impressed by Billy's imitation of Jack-as-Melody. "Christ," he said.

You don't have to make a commitment or anything," Emma said. "That you're my best friend is enough of a miracle.

Graham Greene

beauty, and Owen possessed a

Jack's mother was particularly miserable when she discovered that she wasn't the only choirgirl who'd fallen in love with Jack's father, but she was the only one who was pregnant.

No matter what my fucking last words were, please say they were these: 'I have always known that the pursuit of excellence is a lethal habit.

Robertson Davies

with his own very male instincts, which were otherwise

I remember when you kissed me, he wrote to Dr. Larch. I wasn't really asleep. Yes, thought Dr. Larch, I remember that, too. He rested in the dispensary. Why didn't I kiss him more-why not all the time?

Latin inscription that meant "forever." IN AETERNUM

Assassination, in Wolf's opinion, was "an increasingly popular amateur sport of the times"; and "political true believers," as he called nearly everybody, were always the sworn enemy of the artist—who insisted, however arrogantly, on the superiority of a personal vision.

He had simply made up his mind to go some time before, and that anyone looking for excuses to leave can always find them.

If he'd had half a brain, he might have anticipated the problem inherent in watching a movie with Emma and Claudia.

INTO PARADISE MAY THE ANGELS LEAD YOU

But in her first days with us, Susie was a bear on the rape issue—and on a lot of other issues, too.

Danny knew what Armando would say: "You don't try to make peace with assholes," or words to that effect

I'm crying too much- I can't see where I'm going, Daddy,' Ruth told him again. 'But that's the test, Ruthie. The test is, sometimes there's no place to pull over- sometimes you can't stop, and you have to find a way to keep going. You got it?' 'Got it,' she said. 'So,' her father said, 'now you know everything.

For the Lord will not cast off for ever, but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love; for he does not willingly afflict or grieve the sons of men.

Owen Meany had believed that his death was necessary if others were to be saved from a stupidity and hatred that was destroying him. In that belief, surely he was not so unfamiliar a hero.