The Impossible Generalized Man today is the critic who believes in loving those unworthy of love as well as those worthy –yet believes this only insofar as no personal risk is entailed. Meaning he loves no one, worthy or no. This is what makes him impossible.
—Nelson Algren
Topics: Love
Literature is made upon any occasion that a challenge is put to the legal apparatus by conscience in touch with humanity.
—Nelson Algren
Topics: Books, Literature
The hard necessity of bringing the judge on the bench down into the dock has been the peculiar responsibility of the writer in all ages of man.
—Nelson Algren
Topics: Writers, Authors & Writing, Writing
The avocation of assessing the failures of better men can be turned into a comfortable livelihood, providing you back it up with a Ph.D.
—Nelson Algren
Topics: Criticism, Critics, Education
I went out there for a thousand a week, and I worked Monday, and I got fired Wednesday. The guy that hired me was out of town Tuesday.
—Nelson Algren
Never play cards with a man called Doc. Never eat at a place called Mom s. Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own.
—Nelson Algren
Topics: Advice
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
Philip Roth American Novelist, Short-story Writer
Saul Bellow Canadian-born American Novelist
Kurt Vonnegut American Novelist
Marge Piercy American Poet
Bernard Malamud American Novelist
William Styron American Novelist
Ray Bradbury American Science-Fiction Writer
Philip K. Dick American Novelist
William Faulkner American Novelist
James Lane Allen American Novelist