Sinclair Lewis
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewiswas an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was awarded "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of characters." His works are known for their insightful and critical views of American capitalism and materialism between the wars. He is also respected for his strong characterizations of modern...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth7 February 1885
CitySauk Centre, MN
CountryUnited States of America
Don't be a writer. Writing is an escape from something. You be a scientist.
Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile.
Writing is just work-there's no secret. If you dictate or use a pen or type or write with your toes-it's still just work.
Writers have a rare power not given to anyone else: we can bore people long after we are dead.
Writers kid themselves-about themselves and other people. Take the talk about writing methods. Writing is just work-there's no secret. If you dictate or use a pen or type with your toes-it is just work.
It is impossible to discourage the real writers - they don't give a damn what you say, they're going to write.
. . . she did her work with the thoroughness of a mind which reveres details and never quite understands them . . .
There are two insults no human will endure. The assertion that he has no sense of humor and the doubly impertinent assertion that he has never known trouble.
When facism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.
There are two insults no human being will endure: that he has no sense of humor, and that he has never known trouble.
a dictator with something of the earthy American sense of humor of a Mark Twain, a George Ade, a Will Rogers, an Artemus Ward.
. . . being a man given to oratory and high principles, he enjoyed the sound of his own vocabulary and the warmth of his own virtue.
The most important part of living is not the living but the pondering upon it.
Most troubles are unnecessary. We have Nature beaten; we can make her grow wheat; we can keep warm when she sends blizzards. So we raise the devil just for pleasure--wars, politics, race-hatreds, labor-disputes.