Quotes from Irwin Shaw

A good editor understands what you're talking and writing about and doesn't meddle too much.

When I started out in the early 1930s, there were a great many magazines that published short stories. Unfortunately, the short-story market has dwindled to almost nothing.

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

I cringe when critics say I'm a master of the popular novel. What's an unpopular novel?

Curiously, the United States is full of writers who have one big work in their life and that's all.

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

God Was Here but He Left Early

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.

There are too many books I haven't read, too many places I haven't seen, too many memories I haven't kept long enough.

There are too many books I haven't read, too many places I haven't seen, too many memories I haven't kept long enough

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.

I never drink while I'm working, but after a few glasses I get ideas that would never have occurred to me dead sober.

I look at everything. God gave me eyes and I look at women and men and subway excavations and moving pictures and the little flowers of the field. I casually inspect the universe.

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

If the players were armed with guns, there wouldn't be stadiums large enough to hold the crowds.

Critics in New York are made by their dislikes, not by their enthusiasms.

No writer need feel sorry for himself if he writes and enjoys the writing, even if he doesn't get paid for it.

A taste of luxury is part of the education of any intelligent human being. It teaches him how unnecessary it is.

It is always necessary to remain barbarians, because it is the barbarians who always win.

Horror would not annoy a soldier any more than the sight of a hammer annoys a carpenter. It is sentimental to pretend that horror is not the tool of the soldier, just as the hammer is the tool of the carpenter. We live off death and the threat of death and we must take it calmly and use it well.... Eventually I came to enjoy killing, as a pianist enjoys the Czerny which keeps his fingers limber for the Beethoven.

I make it a point to look as healthy and attractive as I can at all times," Boylan had explained to Rudolph. "Even if I don't see anybody for weeks on end. It's a form of self-respect.

Our imperfections are the bonds that hold us together. We might as well recognize them.

The modern world, he thought resentfully, prepares you very poorly for the tests it puts you to.

The abuse of alcohol," Mr. Parrish said in a solemn, preacher-like voice, as he reached for his glass, "is the one thing that puts Man above the animal.