"Here is one of the fundamental defects of American fiction—perhaps the one character that sets it off sharply from all other known kinds of contemporary fiction. It habitually exhibits, not a man of delicate organization in revolt against the inexplicable tragedy of existence, but a man of low sensibilities and elemental desires yielding himself gladly to his environment, and so achieving what, under a third-rate civilization, passes for success. To get on: this is the aim. To weigh and reflect, to doubt and rebel: this is the thing to be avoided."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
H. L. Mencken, “The National Letters,” Prejudices: Second Series (New York: 1920), pp. 39-40
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fiction
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Fiction
47 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Fiction →
Related Quotes
"Nunc fabularum cur sit inventum genus, Brevi decebo. Servitus obnoxia, Quia, quae volebat, non audebat dicere, Affect…"
"A story with a moral appended is like the bill of a mosquito. It bores you, and then injects a stinging drop to irrit…"
"I do not blame the words, for they are, as it were, choice and precious vessels, but I do deplore the wine of error w…"
"(You once said, "Fiction is NOT autobiography in a party dress." OK, then what is it?) NH: It's what happens after yo…"
"We live in a world ruled by fictions of every kind - mass merchandising, advertising, politics conducted as a branch …"
"People substituted writing (fiction) for what was once spiritual life, poetry (chaotic words) for actual ecstasies. A…"
"Fiction is not imagination. It is what anticipates imagination by giving it the form of reality. This is quite opposi…"
"The author of any work of fiction that is any good takes me so fully into his orbit that he becomes my friend; I thin…"
"Every novel is an ideal plane inserted into the realm of reality."
"Fiction is fact distilled into truth."