John Irving
John Irving
John Winslow Irving is an American novelist and Academy Award-winning screenwriter...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth2 March 1942
CountryUnited States of America
anyone bed dog
I get up early. I like to read a little before anyone but the dog is up. I also like to read at night, not in bed but just before I go to bed.
kids
I never wanted my kids to feel I was more interested in anything I was doing than I was in them.
adult event family principal
The principal event of my childhood was that no adult in my family would tell me who my father was.
affinity particular
I had a particular affinity for wrestling, and it did have a lot to do with being small and being combative - and being angry. And when you're small and you don't back down, you get in a lot of fights.
I don't really set out to explore grand themes. I set out to tell a story. And one I have to be able to imagine right through.
believe novel objective principal
I believe that, in any novel of mine, the principal objective is the construction of the whole.
almost attraction england extinct novelist novels victorian
My first attraction to writing novels was the plot, that almost extinct animal. Those novels I read which made me want to be a novelist were long, always plotted, novels - not just Victorian novels, but also those of my New England ancestors: Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne.
hundred terrified until ways
I wasn't afraid of anything until I had a kid. Then I was terrified because immediately I could imagine a hundred ways in which I could not protect him.
everybody hard plotting
Anybody can do research. The plotting of the novel, writing the ending before you write anything else, which I always do - I don't know that everybody can do that. That's the hard part.
came fourth twenty
'The Fourth Hand' was a novel that came from twenty years of screenwriting concurrently with whatever novel I'm writing.
accidents believe clear explore mapped mere necessary novel recognize route
I believe you have constructive accidents en route through a novel only because you have mapped a clear way. If you have confidence that you have a clear direction to take, you always have confidence to explore other ways; if they prove to be mere digressions, you'll recognize that and make the necessary revisions.
five lived people
I lived five years in the Midwest, and I loved it. The people were so nice. The people were so open.
novels people physical
I find screenplays easy to write, my novels being very visual. You see what people look like. The physical action is described.
love
When I love a novel I've read, I want to reread it - in part, to see how it was constructed.