Literary Force Quotes

My definition of poetry (if I were forced to give one) would be this: words that have become deeds.

Graham Greene at 82 years old was still writing, and I don't think anyone can deny the force, the expertise, and the unique quality of his writing, if you take his complete oeuvre.

I think Henry Miller has had huge influence not because he wrote about sex, but because the memoir or the nonfiction novel has become such a monumental force in American publishing, if not in literature.

A line is a fuse that's lit. The line smolders, the rhyme explodes— and by a stanza a city is blown to bits.

All books are either dreams or swords, you can cut, or you can drug, with words.

Sometimes the books most restrained about sex, even deeply scandalized by it, can whisper to us with the greatest hidden force. I am a huge admirer of the recently deceased, always underranked Evan S. Connell.

Judge the goodness of a book by the energy of the punches it has given you. I believe the greatest characteristic of genius, is, above all, force.

When poetry is on the money, 12 words can slay you. I admire that greatly.