"Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile."

Literature, Writers

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"Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile."

Explore more quotes by Sinclair Lewis

"When audiences come to see us authors lecture, it is largely in the hope that we'll be funnier to look at than to read."

Hope, Audiences

"Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile."

Literature, Writers

"Damn the great executives, the men of measured merriment, damn the men with careful smiles oh, damn their measured merriment."

Man, Men, Merriment, Smiles

"Our American professors like their literature clear and cold and pure and very dead."

Literature,

"There are two insults no human being will endure: that he has no sense of humor, and that he has never known trouble."

Humor, Being, Insults, Sense

"Pugnacity is a form of courage, but a very bad form."

Courage,

"Advertising is a valuable economic factor because it is the cheapest way of selling goods, particularly if the goods are worthless."

Selling, Advertising

Exlpore more Literature quotes

"Fiction offers the best means of understanding people different from oneself, short of experience. Actually, fiction can be lots better than experience, because it's a manageable size, it's comprehensible, while experience just steamrollers over you and you understand what happened decades later, if ever."

Ursula K. Le Guin, American Writer

Literature, Fiction, Understanding, Experience, People

"Books have a vital place in our culture. They are the source of ideas, of stories that engage and stretch the imagination and most importantly, inspire."

Sara Sheridan, Scottish Author

Literature, Books, Culture, Inspirational, Imagination

"A man reading the Dickens novel wished that it might never end. Men read a Dickens story six times because they knew it so well."

Gilbert K. Chesterton, English Writer

Literature, Desire, Nostalgia, Memory

"Molly Bloom is simply the most sensuous woman in literature."

Sara Sheridan, Scottish Author

Literature, Sensuality, Beauty, Fiction

"I am no indiscriminate novel reader. The mere trash of the common circulating library I hold in the highest contempt."

Jane Austen, British Writer

Literature, Reading, Books, Judgment, Quality

"If the novels are still being read in 50 years, no one is ever going to say: 'What's great about that sixth book is that he met his deadline!' It will be about how the whole thing stands up."

George R. R. Martin, American Author

Literature, Legacy, Writing, Art

"It is only a novel... or, in short, only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language."

Jane Austen, British Writer

Literature, Novel, Writing, Talent, Humanity

"Prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated hen-house."

George Orwell, British Author

Literature, Writing, Prose, Creativity, Art

"A life without books is a thirsty life, and one without poetry is...like a life without pictures."

Stephen King, American Author

Literature, Reading, Truth, Wisdom, Power

"I've read everything Thomas Wolfe ever wrote; my brother and I memorized whole chapters of 'You Can't Go Home Again' and 'Look Homeward, Angel.'"

Maya Angelou, American Poet

Literature, Reading, Memory, Brother, Poetry

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Explore more quotes by Sinclair Lewis

"When audiences come to see us authors lecture, it is largely in the hope that we'll be funnier to look at than to read."

"Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile."

"Damn the great executives, the men of measured merriment, damn the men with careful smiles oh, damn their measured merriment."

"Our American professors like their literature clear and cold and pure and very dead."

"There are two insults no human being will endure: that he has no sense of humor, and that he has never known trouble."

"Pugnacity is a form of courage, but a very bad form."

"Advertising is a valuable economic factor because it is the cheapest way of selling goods, particularly if the goods are worthless."

"What is love? It is the morning and the evening star."

"Winter is not a season, it's an occupation."

"The middle class, that prisoner of the barbarian 20th century."

Exlpore more Literature quotes

"Books have a vital place in our culture. They are the source of ideas, of stories that engage and stretch the imagination and most importantly, inspire."

"A man reading the Dickens novel wished that it might never end. Men read a Dickens story six times because they knew it so well."

"Molly Bloom is simply the most sensuous woman in literature."

"I am no indiscriminate novel reader. The mere trash of the common circulating library I hold in the highest contempt."

"If the novels are still being read in 50 years, no one is ever going to say: 'What's great about that sixth book is that he met his deadline!' It will be about how the whole thing stands up."

"Prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated hen-house."

"A life without books is a thirsty life, and one without poetry is...like a life without pictures."

"I've read everything Thomas Wolfe ever wrote; my brother and I memorized whole chapters of 'You Can't Go Home Again' and 'Look Homeward, Angel.'"