Homer & Langley: A Novel
A source page for quotes linked to E. L. Doctorow.
“We are able to walk on air, but only as long as our illusion supports us.”
“I have been everywhere because I don't know what I'm looking for.”
“I worry about images. Images are what things mean.”
“I thought of myself as a writer for years before I got around to writing anything.”
“If you feel a bump on page one hundred, it may be you went off on page fifty.”
“Stories distribute the suffering so that it can be borne.”
“Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing and learn as you go.”
“There is music in words, and it can be heard you know, by thinking.”
“Someone dying asks if there is life after death. Yes, comes the answer, only not yours.”
“Time seems to me a drift, a shifting of sand. And my mind is shifting with it. I am wearing away.”
“The act of composition is a series of discoveries.”
“Planning to write is not writing.”
“The music of the Stones pounds the air like the amplified pulse of my erection.”
“I try to avoid experience if I can. Most experience is bad.”
“The historian will tell you what happened. The novelist will tell you what it felt like.”