Quote

If pride is a sin ... moral pride is the greatest sin.

John Irving

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

John Irving
Age: 82
Born: 1942
Born: March 2
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Exeter
New Hampshire
John Winslow Irving
Greatest
Moral
Sin
Pride

More quotes by John Irving

Image
I have always believed that, in a story, if something traumatic or calamitous enough happens to a kid at a formative age, that will make him or her the adult they become.
John Irving
Image
Kids are beautiful, man. And they know much more than grownups think they know. Kids are just perfect people until grownups get their hands on them.
John Irving
Image
It's not right to hurt or deceive someone who's already been hurt and deceived.
John Irving
Image
When I finally write the first sentence, I want to know everything that happens, so that I am not inventing the story as I write it - rather, I am remembering a story that has already happened.
John Irving
Image
The unspoken factor is love. The reason I can work so hard at my writing is that it's not work for me.
John Irving
Image
Owen Meany believed that “coincidence” was a stupid, shallow refuge sought by stupid, shallow people who were unable to accept the fact that their lives were shaped by a terrifying and awesome design – more powerful and unstoppable than the Yankee Flyer. (a train)
John Irving
Image
Don't forget this, too: Rumors aren't interested in the unsensational story rumors don't care what's true.
John Irving
Image
What has been violated here is your freedom of choice, and every woman's freedom of choice, too.
John Irving
Image
Safer than we are.” I told Franny. “Safer than love.” “let me tell ya kid,” Franny said to me, squeezing my hand. “Everything’s safer than love.
John Irving
Image
I take people very seriously. People are all I take seriously, in fact. Therefore, I have nothing but sympathy for how people behave - and nothing but laughter to console them with.
John Irving
Image
Is it a democratic society that condemns people to the accident of conception? What are we-monkeys? If you expect people to be responsible for their children, you have to give them the right to choose whether or not to have children. What are you people thinking of? You're not only crazy! You're ogres!
John Irving
Image
Thus we try to keep our heroes alive hence we remember them.
John Irving
Image
Almost everyone is dying to leave home, eventually and almost everyone needs to.
John Irving
Image
My dear boy, please don’t put a label on me—don’t make me a category before you get to know me!
John Irving
Image
A truly happy woman drives some men and almost every other woman absolutely crazy
John Irving
Image
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
Image
So, you see, it's a real chore for me to write a book review because it's like a contest. It's like I'm writing that book review for every bad book reviewer I've ever known and it's a way of saying [thrusts a middle finger into the air] this is how you ought to do it. I like to rub their noses in it.
John Irving
Image
There is no straightforward negotiation with a four year old.
John Irving
Image
I have no respect for the right-to-life position, though I have every respect for an individual who says, I could never have that procedure, I could never see a film or read a book about that procedure. It doesn't bother me if people feel that way.
John Irving
Image
Life is an X-rated soap opera.
John Irving