author's duty Quotes

My only obligation is to my characters. And they came from where I have been.

At the end of the day I am a writer, and if I don't take care of this, no one else will.

Dostoevski informs everybody; or he ought to.

It is an author's primary duty to entertain. Sling out all the philosophical terms, but keep the reader turning the page.

I can't imagine why everybody is always so keen for authors to talk about writing. I should have thought it was an author's business to write, not talk.

If you're going to clutter up the world with more novels, you should do a little more than entertain people.

The writer who can't do his job looks to his editor to do it for him, though he won't dream of sharing his royalties with that editor.

An author's first duty is to let down his country.

Read proudly--put the duty of being read invariably on the author. If he is not read, whose fault is it? I am quite ready to be charmed, but I shall not make-believe I am charmed.

I feel a responsibility, as I get older, to be responsible to what I've experienced, to what I've lived and been in a position to witness. I realize now that as a consequence of having lived the life I have, quite apart from the one, as I understand it, lived by most American writers, maybe I now know some things and have some stories to tell that others don't know about or wouldn't be able to tell. Maybe there's an intrinsic value in that lived experience and knowledge, though of course what you do with it is everything.

As a writer, my only responsibility is to tell a compelling story.

To me a book is a message from the gods to mankind; or, if not, should never be published at all. A message from the gods should be delivered at once. It is damnably blasphemous to talk about the autumn season and so on. How dare the author or publisher demand a price for doing his duty, the highest and most honorable to which a man can be called?