There is no pleasing New Englanders, my dear, their soil is all rocks and their hearts are bloodless absolutes.

Quote by John Updike

Topics: John Updike Quotes

Golf appeals to the idiot in us and the child. Just how childlike golf players...

Golf appeals to the idiot in us and the child. Just how childlike golf players...

Being naked approaches being revolutionary; going barefoot is mere populism.

Being naked approaches being revolutionary; going barefoot is mere populism.

Possession diminishes perception of value, immediately

Possession diminishes perception of value, immediately

A healthy male adult bore consumes each year one and a half times his own...

A healthy male adult bore consumes each year one and a half times his own...

It was one of history's great love stories, the mutually profitable romance which Hollywood and...

It was one of history's great love stories, the mutually profitable romance which Hollywood and...

For male and female alike, the bodies of the other sex are messages signaling what...

For male and female alike, the bodies of the other sex are messages signaling what...

But for a few phrases from his letters and an odd line or two of...

But for a few phrases from his letters and an odd line or two of...

By the time a partnership dissolves, it has dissolved.

By the time a partnership dissolves, it has dissolved.

What art offers is space - a certain breathing room for the spirit.

What art offers is space - a certain breathing room for the spirit.

To say that war is madness is like saying that sex is madness: true enough,...

To say that war is madness is like saying that sex is madness: true enough,...

The refusal to rest content, the willingness to risk excess on behalf of one's obsessions,...

The refusal to rest content, the willingness to risk excess on behalf of one's obsessions,...

Government is either organized benevolence or organized madness; its peculiar magnitude permits no shading.

Government is either organized benevolence or organized madness; its peculiar magnitude permits no shading.

The inner spaces that a good story lets us enter are the old apartments of...

The inner spaces that a good story lets us enter are the old apartments of...

Customs and convictions change; respectable people are the last to know, or to admit, the...

Customs and convictions change; respectable people are the last to know, or to admit, the...

Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right or better.

Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right or better.

Every marriage tends to consist of an aristocrat and a peasant. Of a teacher and...

Every marriage tends to consist of an aristocrat and a peasant. Of a teacher and...

Inspiration arrives as a packet of material to be delivered.

Inspiration arrives as a packet of material to be delivered.

Writers may be disreputable, incorrigible, early to decay or late to bloom but they dare...

Writers may be disreputable, incorrigible, early to decay or late to bloom but they dare...

I have suffered a great deal from writers who have quoted this or that sentence...

I have suffered a great deal from writers who have quoted this or that sentence...

You cannot be a good writer of serious fiction if you are not depressed

You cannot be a good writer of serious fiction if you are not depressed