Isaac Bashevis Singer

The waste basket is a writer's best friend.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

The New England conscience doesn't keep you from doing what you shouldn't -- it just keeps you from enjoying it.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

The greatness of art is not to find what is common but what is unique.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

If you keep on saying things are going to be bad, you have a good chance of being a prophet.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

There is great treasure there behind our skull and this is true about all of us. This little treasure has great, great powers, and I would say we only have learnt a very, very small part of what it can do.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

The second half of the twentieth century is a complete flop.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

A good writer is basically a story teller, not a scholar or a redeemer of mankind.

— Isaac Bashevis Singer

Some of the townspeople stood on the wooden bridge reciting the Tashlikh ; others lined the river's banks. Young women took out their handkerchiefs [sic] and shook out their sins. Boys playfully emptied their pockets to be sure that no transgression remained. The village wits made the traditional Tashlikh jokes. "Girls, shake as hard as you want, but a few sins will remain." "The fish will get fat feeding on so many errors."

— Isaac Bashevis Singer