The images of things are not the things in themselves. E. L. Doctorow More Quotes by E. L. Doctorow More Quotes From E. L. Doctorow History is the present. That's why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product, myth. E. L. Doctorow truthwritingthinking In the twentieth century one of the most personal relationships to have developed is that of the person and the state. It's become a fact of life that governments have become very intimate with people, most always to their detriment. E. L. Doctorow governmentfactspeople Writers are not just people who sit down and write. They hazard themselves. Every time you compose a book your composition of yourself is at stake. E. L. Doctorow writingbookpeople I try to avoid experience if I can. Most experience is bad. E. L. Doctorow i-canifstrying A novel is a printed circuit through which flows the force of a reader's own life. E. L. Doctorow forceflowfiction The act of composition is a series of discoveries. E. L. Doctorow compositionwritingdiscovery I am led to the proposition that there is no fiction or nonfiction as we commonly understand the distinction: there is only narrative. E. L. Doctorow distinctionnarrativefiction I like commas. I detest semi-colons — I don’t think they belong in a story. And I gave up quotation marks long ago. I found I didn’t need them, they were fly-specks on the page. E. L. Doctorow long-agoneedsthinking Facts are the images of history, just as images are the facts of fiction. E. L. Doctorow factsfiction Longing, the hope for fulfillment, is the one unwavering passion of the world's commerce. E. L. Doctorow longingpassionworld I lived in New York for a couple months. It seemed to me at first an incredibly clean place with well-dressed people and washed cars and bright-painted red-and-yellow streetcars and white buildings. E. L. Doctorow couplenew-yorkyellow We make a mistake to condescend to the past as if it were preparatory to our own time. E. L. Doctorow ifsmistakepast Implications of treason are fed like cubes of sugar to the twelve-headed animal which is justice. In ... opening remarks. In the way questions are asked. In support of lines of questioning where cases of treason are cited and the Judge endorses the relevance of the citation. E. L. Doctorow judgingjusticeanimal And so do people pass out of one's life and all you can remember of them is their humanity, a poor fitful thing of no dominion, like your own. E. L. Doctorow dominionhumanitypeople So that individuation may be compared to a pyramid in that it is only achieved by the placement of the top stone… The Jews, Ford said. They ain't like anyone else I know. There goes you theory up shits creek. He smiled. E. L. Doctorow pyramidsstonesmay Communists have no respect for people, only for positions. E. L. Doctorow communistno-respectpeople The voice of the Constitution is the inescapably solemn self-consciousness of the people giving the law unto themselves. E. L. Doctorow voiceselflaw It proposed that human beings, by the act of making witness, warranted times and places for their existence other than the time and place they were living through. E. L. Doctorow ragtimeexistencewitness The theory for admitting accomplice testimony that is uncorroborated is that conspiracy is by its nature secretive and that only the parties to it can know it occurred. But in practice this means the accomplice's guilt is modified to the degree that he can convict the defendant. E. L. Doctorow partypracticemean I thought I would lose, so I didn't prepare a speech. E. L. Doctorow losesspeech
