John Updike Quotes

I'm very lucky. I'm very fortunate that my books have never gone out of print - none of them.

I'm not one of those writers that sits worrying about posthumous fame.

The measure of a great writer is not how many weeks his books spend on the best-seller lists, but how many years his books remain in print after his death.

Most people know my music but will never read my books.

Books are divided into two classes, the books of the hour and the books of all time.

I wanted to see my name on the cover of a book. If your name is in the Library of Congress, you're immortal.

Whenever anyone calls me 'The new J..K. Rowling,' I think, 'What's wrong with the old one?'

An author departs, he does not die.

I want to write books that can truly become a legacy and bring benefits to people.

What's gratifying is that it's my books that are being read and reread until they're battered over the years. I love that.

When I am dead, I hope it may be said: His sins were scarlet, but his books were read.

I have been writing for 50 years and readers still read my first book from when I was in the Marine Corps.

Great men, unknown to their generation, have their fame among the great who have preceded them, and all true worldly fame subsides from their high estimate beyond the stars.

You want all your books to stick around after you've gone.

I want to be remembered. I want to have a legacy. Van Gogh only sold one painting before he died, which would mean that he wasn't famous when he was alive. But in 2017, I know who Van Gogh is.

Fortunately age does not affect literature. After a man is dead, he may continue in the business and often rank higher than his living competitors.

I want to do something splendid… Something heroic or wonderful that won’t be forgotten after I’m dead… I think I shall write books.

If any of my plays outlive me or get on library book shelves and somehow stay read, all of a sudden it's a testament to "that's part of our culture, that's part of our history."

My work is known by too few people for me to be remembered as a writer - that is, beyond those dedicated souls (bless them) who have followed the oeuvre through its various stages. To be realistic, when they and the last of my friends have died, I doubt I shall be remembered at all.

Only well-written works will descend to posterity. Fulness of knowledge, interesting facts, even useful inventions, are no pledge of immortality, for they may be employed by more skilful hands; they are outside the man; the style is the man himself.

Our lives are fictions, a work we leave behind, signed.

There is a certain virtue in every good man, which night and day stirs up the mind with the stimulus of glory, and reminds it that all mention of our name will not cease at the same time with our lives, but that our fame will endure to all posterity.

Men after death ... are understood worse than men of the moment, but heard better.

Johnny Cash has only passed into the greater light. He will only become more important in this industry as time goes by.