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Iris Murdoch did influence my early novels very much, and influence is never entirely good.

A. N. Wilson

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A. N. Wilson
Age: 74
Born: 1950
Born: January 1
Biographer
Historian
Novelist
Teacher
Writer
Stone
Staffordshire
Andrew Norman Wilson
Much
Iris
Good
Murdoch
Never
Irises
Novels
Entirely
Early
Novel
Influence

More quotes by A. N. Wilson

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On the rare occasions when I spend a night in Oxford, the keeping of the hours by the clock towers in New College, and Merton, and the great booming of Tom tolling 101 times at 9 pm at Christ Church are inextricably interwoven with memories and regrets and lost joys. The sound almost sends me mad, so intense are the feelings it evokes.
A. N. Wilson
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In universities and intellectual circles, academics can guarantee themselves popularity - or, which is just as satisfying, unpopularity - by being opinionated rather than by being learned.
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Everyone writes in Tolstoy's shadow, whether one feels oneself to be Tolstoyan or not.
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In general, Hitler embodied the view of any popular newspaper.
A. N. Wilson
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History does not eliminate grievances. It lays them down like landmines.
A. N. Wilson
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I think that if you can't be loyal to the Church, it's best to get out.
A. N. Wilson
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When Christians start thinking about Jesus, things start breaking down, they lose their faith. It's perfectly possible to go to church every Sunday and not ask any questions, just because you like it as a way of life. They fear that if they ask questions they'll lose their Christ, the very linchpin of their religion.
A. N. Wilson
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I think I became a Catholic to annoy my father.
A. N. Wilson
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Watching a whole cluster of friends, and my own mother, die over quite a short space of time convinced me that purely materialist 'explanations' for our mysterious human existence simply won't do - on an intellectual level.
A. N. Wilson
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I don't write books inadvertently.
A. N. Wilson
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Nearly all monster stories depend for their success on Jack killing the Giant, Beowulf or St. George slaying the Dragon, Harry Potter triumphing over the basilisk. That is their inner grammar, and the whole shape of the story leads towards it.
A. N. Wilson
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IQ in general has improved since tests first began. Psychologists think that this is because modern life becomes ever more complicated.
A. N. Wilson
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I'm like Jane Austen - I work on the corner of the dining table.
A. N. Wilson
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I don't think you can tell the objective truth about a person. That's why people write novels.
A. N. Wilson
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Fear of death has never played a large part in my consciousness - perhaps unimaginative of me.
A. N. Wilson
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Anti-Semitism is extremely common.
A. N. Wilson
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I am shy to admit that I have followed the advice given all those years ago by a wise archbishop to a bewildered young man: that moments of unbelief 'don't matter,' that if you return to a practice of the faith, faith will return.
A. N. Wilson
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I very much dislike the intolerance and moralism of many Christians, and feel more sympathy with Honest Doubters than with them.
A. N. Wilson
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The Royal Family are not like you and me. They live in houses so big that you can walk round all day and never need to meet your spouse. The Queen and Prince Philip have never shared a bedroom in their lives. They don't even have breakfast together.
A. N. Wilson
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I think one of the very frightening things about the regime of the National Socialists is that it made people happy.
A. N. Wilson