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Isaac Bashevis Singer
29 quotes
“We must believe in free will — we have no choice.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: An ironic statement which Singer made in many interviews over many years; here quoted in "Isaac Singer’s Promised City" City Journal (Summer 1997)
“I am a vegetarian for health reasons—the health of the chicken.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Singer was very devoted to the vegetarian cause and was frequently quoted as saying this statement, as reported in Judaism and Vegetarianism by Richard H. Schwartz (New York: Lantern Books, 2001, ), p. 177
“As often as Herman had witnessed the slaughter of animals and fish, he always had the same thought: in their behavior toward creatures, all men were Nazis. The smugness with which man could do with other species as he pleased exemplified the most extreme racist theories, the principle that might is right.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1972 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Enemies, A Love Story (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1972), p. 257
“Life is God's novel. Let him write it.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1975 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted in Voices for Life (1975) edited by Dom Moraes
“I am thankful, of course, for the prize and thankful to God for each story, each idea, each word, each day.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On winning the Nobel Prize, TIME magazine (16 October 1978)
“I don't invent characters because the Almightly has already invented millions… Just like experts at fingerprints do not create fingerprints but learn how to read them.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (26 November 1978)
“The analysis of character is the highest human entertainment.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (26 November 1978)
“A story to me means a plot where there is some surprise… Because that is how life is — full of surprises.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (26 November 1978)
“The Jewish people have been in exile for 2,000 years; they have lived in hundreds of countries, spoken hundreds of languages and still they kept their old language, Hebrew. They kept their Aramaic, later their Yiddish; they kept their books; they kept their faith.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (26 November 1978)
“Doubt is part of all religion. All the religious thinkers were doubters.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (3 December 1978)
“Our knowledge is a little island in a great ocean of nonknowledge.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (3 December 1978)
“Even in love, people betray themselves. And when you betray somebody else, you also betray yourself. I would say a great part of human history is a history of self-betrayal and betrayal of others.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Isaac Bashevis Singer's Universe" by Richard Burgin in The New York Times (3 December 1978)
“Children don't read to find their identity, to free themselves from guilt, to quench the thirst for rebellion or to get rid of alienation. They have no use for psychology... They still believe in God, the family, angels, devils, witches, goblins, logic, clarity, punctuation, and other such obsolete stuff... When a book is boring, they yawn openly. They don't expect their writer to redeem humanity, but leave to adults such childish illusions.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1978 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Nobel lecture as quoted in The Observer (17 December 1978) Variant: "They still believe in God, the family, angels, witches, goblins, logic, clarity, punctuation, and other obsolete stuff.
“When I was a little boy, they called me a liar, but now that I am grown up, they call me a writer.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1983 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: TIME (18 July 1983)
“We write not only for children but also for their parents. They, too, are serious children.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1984 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Stories for Children (1984)
“Take three quarts of duck's milk...”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1984 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: First words of a "recipe for high-priced cookies" in Stories for Children (1984)
“If Moses had been paid newspaper rates for the Ten Commandments, he might have written the Two Thousand Commandments.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1985 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Times (30 June 1985)
“I started to "write" even before I knew the alphabet. I would dip a pen in ink and scribble. I also liked to draw — horses, houses, dogs. The Sabbath was an ordeal for me, because it is forbidden to write on that day.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A Day of Pleasure" (1996)
“I know as a writer how valuable a tool is the wastebasket. Perhaps God throws away many experiments before He finds the right expression. Perhaps we are the discards — or we could be the part He keeps. This mystery is what keeps us all going, to see what happens in the next chapter.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Isaac Singer’s Promised City" by Stefan Kanfer in City Journal (Summer 1997)
“Not only has our generation lost faith in Providence but also in man himself, in his institutions and often in those who are nearest to him. In their despair a number of those who no longer have confidence in the leadership of our society look up to the writer, the master of words. They hope against hope that the man of talent and sensitivity can perhaps rescue civilization. Maybe there is a spark of the prophet in the artist after all.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I have many times resigned myself to never finding a true way out. But a new hope always emerges telling me that it is not yet too late for all of us to take stock and make a decision. I was brought up to believe in free will.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Although I came to doubt all revelation, I can never accept the idea that the Universe is a physical or chemical accident, a result of blind evolution. Even though I learned to recognize the lies, the clichés and the idolatries of the human mind, I still cling to some truths which I think all of us might accept some day. There must be a way for man to attain all possible pleasures, all the powers and knowledge that nature can grant him, and still serve God — a God who speaks in deeds, not in words, and whose vocabulary is the Cosmos.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am not ashamed to admit that I belong to those who fantasize that literature is capable of bringing new horizons and new perspectives — philosophical, religious, aesthetical and even social. In the history of old Jewish literature there was never any basic difference between the poet and the prophet. Our ancient poetry often became law and a way of life.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Strange as these words may sound I often play with the idea that when all the social theories collapse and wars and revolutions leave humanity in utter gloom, the poet — whom Plato banned from his Republic — may rise up to save us all.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One can find in the Yiddish tongue and in the Yiddish spirit expressions of pious joy, lust for life, longing for the Messiah, patience and deep appreciation of human individuality. There is a quiet humor in Yiddish and a gratitude for every day of life, every crumb of success, each encounter of love. The Yiddish mentality is not haughty. It does not take victory for granted. It does not demand and command but it muddles through, sneaks by, smuggles itself amidst the powers of destruction, knowing somewhere that God's plan for Creation is still at the very beginning.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There are some who call Yiddish a dead language, but so was Hebrew called for two thousand years. It has been revived in our time in a most remarkable, almost miraculous way. Aramaic was certainly a dead language for centuries but then it brought to light the Zohar, a work of mysticism of sublime value.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Yiddish has not yet said its last word. It contains treasures that have not been revealed to the eyes of the world. It was the tongue of martyrs and saints, of dreamers and Cabalists — rich in humor and in memories that mankind may never forget. In a figurative way, Yiddish is the wise and humble language of us all, the idiom of frightened and hopeful Humanity.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Vegetarianism is my religion. I became a consistent vegetarian some twenty-three years ago. Before that, I would try over and over again. But it was sporadic. Finally, in the mid-1960s, I made up my mind. And I've been a vegetarian ever since. When a human kills an animal for food, he is neglecting his own hunger for justice. Man prays for mercy, but is unwilling to extend it to others. Why should man then expect mercy from God? It's unfair to expect something that you are not willing to give. … This is my protest against the conduct of the world. To be a vegetarian is to disagree — to disagree with the course of things today. Nuclear power, starvation, cruelty — we must make a statement against these things. Vegetarianism is my statement. And I think it's a strong one.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) first seen 1987 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Preface to Food for the Spirit: Vegetarianism and the World Religions by Steven Rosen (New York: Bala Books, 1987, )
“The storyteller and poet of our time, as in any other time, must be an entertainer of the spirit in the full sense of the word, not just a preacher of social or political ideals. There is no paradise for bored readers and no excuse for tedious literature that does not intrigue the reader, uplift him, give him the joy and the escape that true art always grants. Nevertheless, it is also true that the serious writer of our time must be deeply concerned about the problems of his generation. He cannot but see that the power of religion, especially belief in revelation, is weaker today than it was in any other epoch in human history. More and more children grow up without faith in God, without belief in reward and punishment, in the immortality of the soul and even in the validity of ethics. The genuine writer cannot ignore the fact that the family is losing its spiritual foundation.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source