Latest James Ellroy Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• You try to learn who you are. You work hard. You've either got it or you don't when it comes to writing books. And you tend to only get these things if you want them, and want them to the exclusion of everything else.

  James Ellroy

  Book, Hard Work, Writing

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I'm trying to be less bombastic. I love my books. I think I've done things nobody else has done.

  James Ellroy

  Book, Thinking, Trying

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I don't think I came out of anybody. I think I developed out of the influences I described in My Dark Places. American history, L.A. of the 1950s. I'm comfortable with that.

  James Ellroy

  Dark, Thinking, Influence

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I think I'm out of crime fiction now, and I think the dividing line is American Tabloid.

  James Ellroy

  Thinking, Fiction, Tabloids

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I don't think I will write anything that could be even remotely considered a genre novel from this point on. I think I've graduated.

  James Ellroy

  Writing, Thinking, Genre

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• Joe Wambaugh's a friend. I know him only casually, but I like him a lot. I think he likes my books.

  James Ellroy

  Book, Thinking, Likes

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• [Raymond] Chandler, I reread him, and there's a lot of bad writing there. I don't think he knew much about people.

  James Ellroy

  Writing, Thinking, People

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I needed to address that I've had some profound moral shifts in my own life.

  James Ellroy

  Profound, Addresses, Moral

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I cleaned up. I quit drinking, I quit doing drugs, I quit stealing, I quit breaking into houses, I tried to quit being a bad human being. I developed a conscience later in life than many. I call it the lost-time-regained dynamic.

  James Ellroy

  Drinking, Later In Life, House

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• My guys are morally weak, and they reach toward a tenuous knowledge of self-sacrifice, and sometimes it's too late. I find that moving. It's not a life I'd want to live. But, then, I'm not completely my books.

  James Ellroy

  Moving, Book, Sacrifice

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I'm not interested in popular culture. I hate Quentin Tarantino. I rarely go to movies. I hate rock 'n' roll. I work. I think. I listen to classical music. I brood. I like sports cars.

  James Ellroy

  Sports, Hate, Thinking

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I think the great unspoken theme in noir fiction is male self-pity. It pervades noir movies.

  James Ellroy

  Thinking, Self, Males

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• The 250-page outline for American Tabloid. The books are so dense. They're so complex, you cannot write like I write off the top of your head. It's the combination of that meticulousness and the power of the prose and, I think, the depth of the characterizations and the risks that I've taken with language that give the books their clout. And that's where I get pissed off at a lot of my younger readers.

  James Ellroy

  Book, Taken, Writing

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I got a woman I'm loyal to above all things, above my career. She's profound to me. I'm quiet. I live in Kansas City. I work.

  James Ellroy

  Cities, Careers, Kansas City

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• If I wanted to make money I would have written another novel.

  James Ellroy

  Making Money, Novel, Wanted

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I like to have fun out there. I work hard, and then I get to cut loose and go out and tour, and I enjoy it. I like to go out and meet the people. I love to sell books.

  James Ellroy

  Fun, Book, Hard Work

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• Anything less than total candor was bullshit. I owed that to my readers, I owed that to myself, and I owed that most specifically to my mother. I've had some thrilling moments in my 18-year literary career to this point, and nothing comes close to giving Geneva Hilliker Ellroy, the farm girl from Tunnel City, Wisconsin, to the world.

  James Ellroy

  Girl, Mother, Tunnels

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• My father actually went to college, and my mother went to nursing school, so, you know. I wouldn't... They were actually too square and right-wing to be hip, too well-educated to be white trash, too sexy to be square. They really didn't fit any mold. They weren't really hipsters. They were just - they were two of a kind, those two.

  James Ellroy

  Sexy, Mother, Father

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• How did I change my life? I wanted things. I wanted women and I wanted to write books.

  James Ellroy

  Book, Writing, Changing My Life

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I wanted things. Whatever it cost and whatever it took, I would do it. And that's it.

  James Ellroy

  Cost, Wanted

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I drank, I used drugs, I broke into houses, sniffed women's undergarments. I ate Benzedrex inhalers, jacked off for 18 hours at a pop, lived with my dad in a shitpad.

  James Ellroy

  Dad, House, Drug

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I almost had an intransigent mental spirit. I always wanted things.

  James Ellroy

  Spirit, Wanted

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• My role relationship to the event will continue to mutate. My relationship to my mother will continue to change as I revise my judgments of her depending on what I learn about her. It goes on. But I feel no less obsessive about my work and no less passionately committed to the life I have now, but I feel poised inside. Which is a good thing to feel at 48.

  James Ellroy

  Mother, Events, Roles

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• I'm grateful for the life I have. I lived bad for many years, and I've got a great life now. I've got the kind of life people only dream about.

  James Ellroy

  Dream, Grateful, Years

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview by John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.

• Closure is a preposterous concept worthy of the worst aspects of American daytime TV.

  James Ellroy

  Tvs, Closure, Aspect

  "The Onion talks to crime-fiction kingpin James Ellroy". Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. November 20, 1996.