Edward Albee Quotes

I was quite a reader before I became a writer.

Shakespeare shows you what it is possible to do in English as a writer - but also shows you that you might as well give up. As it's all been done before and hundreds of years ago. So I have had that long-standing relationship of oppression and inspiration.

It's almost uncanny to receive a prize named in honor of Bernard Malamud. I must have been in my early teens when 'The Magic Barrel' was published and I first read it.

I read very widely, both non-fiction and fiction, so I don't think there's a single writer who influences me.

Oh, I think every author is inspired by all of the books that she reads.

I would have to say the novel 'War and Peace' influenced me more than any other book. This greatest of novels demonstrated to me the enormous power of literature and fired me up with a desire to become a writer, to participate in what I considered then to be the greatest of all endeavors.

Authors are influenced by everything they've ever read. If you've read widely enough, it helps you create your own mix.

I read the same amount of nonfiction and fiction.

I'm reading a lot of different books, but I always think I have to switch it up a little bit. It's like food - everything in moderation, same with my books, same with my reading. You read books that are good for you and you learn a lot of stuff, then you read 'Fifty Shades of Grey,' which is like candy.

So, whenever I'm writing, I'm writing in the presence of all the other books I've read and I think we all are.

Nobody writes like Nabokov; nobody ever will. What I would give to write one sentence like Vladimir!

I think I learned about the relationship between books and life from Margaret Mitchell.

The books I read, if they intrude on my writing, do so as weather will pass through and touch a landscape - affecting it, yes, but only now and then leaving a permanent mark.

Writers don't write writing, they write reading. When I was a kid, I read four or five books a week. And that is how I became a writer.

Perhaps the writer I've read the most of is Haruki Murakami, the Japanese writer, but I wouldn't necessarily say he's a favourite. I read him because I find his work so intriguing, but I don't necessarily feel I would follow this writer to the ends of the earth.

With traditional school visits, I also get to speak with people who haven't read my books and talk about my writing process as well as the serious aspects I write about.

I quite liked Dostoyevsky when I was younger.

When I was growing up, I remember having read all the books in the library. I often tried to emulate my favourite writers.

I read two books at a time. One that is heavy and one that makes for light reading.

I made use of the college library by borrowing books other than scientific books, such as all of the plays by George Bernard Shaw, the writing of Edgar Allan Poe. The college library helped me to develop a broader aspect on life.

All great literary works influence us as writers, not their stories as much as their storytelling ability.

I don't think they [contemporary writers] read me either. I mean, if we're concerned genuinely with writing, I think we probably get on with our work.

I think the best writers are voracious readers who pick up the cadences and the feel of narration through a number of different books. And you begin by maybe copying the style of writers that really knocked you out.

Writers do not come out of houses without books.

Jim Harrison is someone I always enjoy, one of the great contemporary writers. I like Tim Ferris' Big Boom Theory. I'm getting into a different kind of reading, not straight novels.