Quotes by Modern Novel A book is sent out into the world, and there is no way of fully anticipating the responses it will elicit. Consider the responses called forth by the Bible, Homer, Shakespeare - let alone contemporary poetry or a modern novel. Chaim Potok modern-novel book world Books of quick interest, that hurry on for incidents are for the eye to glide over only. It will not do to read them out. I could never listen to even the better kind of modern novels without extreme irksomeness. Charles Lamb modern-novel eye book For being able to use language was a critical skill that could carry one far. One could use it professionally, as a crafter of everything from political speeches to modern novels. One could use it personally, as a tool of discovery or a means of staying connected to others. One could use it as an outlet that would feed the artistic spirit of the creator, which existed in everyone. Elizabeth George modern-novel skills mean The great modern novel of the comic-pathetic illusion of freedom is Confessions of Zeno . Italo Svevo modern-novel confession illusion In modern novels I try to not let myself get away and to be here, and that's why I write about my life and myself. But even when I do that there's an element of disappearing to a place that's not me. It's "the selflessness of writing". It seldom happens, but when it does it's worth quite a lot. Karl Ove Knausgard modern-novel writing trying I also read modern novels - I have just had to read 60 as I am one of the judges for the Orange Fiction Prize. Kate Adie modern-novel orange judging Many modern novels have a beginning, a muddle and an end. Philip Larkin modern-novel ends writing I read a lot of detective stories because they always deliver. They give you a beginning, a middle, and an end - a resolution. The modern novels I read don't always deliver because I'm looking essentially for a story. As in Shakespeare, "The play's the thing." In particular I read detective stories for pacing, plot and suspense. Robert Cormier modern-novel play giving At the emergence of the modern novel with Rabelais and Cervantes, all kinds of things were possible in a long-form prose work. Within a couple of hundred years, most of those possibilities were abandoned in favor of a text that efficiently transmitted sentiments. Teju Cole modern-novel couple years