E. L. Doctorow Quotes & Sayings (Page 3)

“I can walk into a bookstore and hand over my credit card and they don't know who the hell I am. Maybe that says something about bookstore clerks.”

“I did have a feeling then that the culture of factuality was so dominating that storytelling had lost all its authority.”

“I try to avoid experience if I can. Most experience is bad.”

“Things that appear on the front page of the newspaper as 'fact' are far more dangerous than the games played by a novelist, and can lead to wars.”

“When I'm writing, I like to seal everything off and face the wall, not to look outside the window. The only way out is through the sentences.”

“When you're working well, you don't do research. Whatever you need comes to you.”

“To have the regard of one's peers is immensely moving.”

“I began to ask two questions while I was reading a book that excited me: not only what was going to happen next, but how is this done? How is it that these words on the page make me feel the way I'm feeling? This is the line of inquiry that I think happens in a child's mind, without him even knowing he has aspirations as a writer.”

“One of the things I had to learn as a writer was to trust the act of writing. To put myself in the position of writing to find out what I was writing.”

“I have a number of vices, one of which is moderation.”