162 Quotes by E. L. Doctorow

When I’m writing, I like to seal everything off and face the wall, not to look outside the window. The only way out is through the sentences.

One of the things I had to learn as a writer was to trust the act of writing.

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.

The writer isn’t made in a vacuum. Writers are witnesses. The reason we need writers is because we need witnesses to this terrifying century.

There is no longer any such thing as fiction or nonfiction; there’s only narrative.

The act of composition is a series of discoveries.

Every major work of art is a transgression, but the artist is not necessarily, by nature, a transgressor.

Time seems to me a drift, a shifting of sand. And my mind is shifting with it. I am wearing away.

A new reader shouldn’t be able to find you in your work, though someone who’s read more may begin to.