Mario Vargas Llosa Quotes

Film is a tool of change.

Literature births activists.

Yes, for all of us in the Shakespeare Squadron, writing is just that: not an escape from reality, but an attempt to change reality.

The job of the writer is to make revolution irresistible.

I have to believe that literature can effect change; otherwise, I would have no purpose in my life and would have wasted four years on 'Ilustrado.'

Literature is my calling To hold up the mirror to my countrymen comes natural to me; and in the open field of invention I am not without hopes of giving them pleasure.

I don't write tracts, I write novels. I'm not a preacher, I'm a fiction writer.

In Ireland, novels and plays still have a strange force. The writing of fiction and the creation of theatrical images can affect life there more powerfully and stealthily than speeches, or even legislation. Imagined worlds can lodge deeply in the private sphere, dislodging much else, especially when the public sphere is fragile.

I cannot live or write without music. It stimulates the normally dormant parts of my brain that come in handy when constructing fiction.

Every once in a while I feel the tremendous force of the novel. But it does not stay with me.

Writing fiction has become a priestly business in countries that have lost their faith.

Literature is the question minus the answer.

When I try to understand somebody, create a character, I fall into them. When I think writers are telling me what to think, I get harrumphy.

Literature, of course, is not a contest.

The writer can choose what he writes about but he cannot choose what he is able to make live.

When you're a writer, everything that interests you feeds into your work.

Writing gives me the opportunity to explore ideas, play with language, solve problems, use my imagination, and draw on my own childhood.

I think the job of writing and literature is to encourage each one of us to believe that we're living in a story.

Fiction is socially meaningful.

Name the book that made the biggest impression on you. I bet you read it before you hit puberty. In the time I've got left, I intend to write artistic books - for kids - because they're still open to new ideas.

I think that the world is very complex. I think that the movie is a good way to ask questions. To give answers, you would write a lot of books.

Surely it is a magical thing for a handful of words, artfully arranged, to stop time. To conjure a place, a person, a situation, in all its specificity and dimensions. To affect us and alter us, as profoundly as real people and things do.

Gene Roddenbury felt that television was being wasted. That it had the potential for enlightenment and even inspiration.

I'm drawn to making films that in some way move the social conversation.

Sometimes I write about my own life. And sometimes I write about situations I see my friends going through. Sometimes I write about a scene I saw in a movie. I take inspiration from all different places.