Isaac Bashevis Singer - Life Quotes

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A story to me means a plot where there is some surprise… Because that is how life is — full of surprises.

Isaac Bashevis Singer
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
There is a quiet humor in Yiddish and a gratitude for every day of life, every crumb of success, each encounter of love.... In a figurative way, Yiddish is the wise and humble language of us all, the idiom of a frightened and hopeful humanity.

Isaac Bashevis Singer
The very essence of literature is the war between emotion and intellect, between life and death. When literature becomes too intellectual - when it begins to ignore the passions, the emotions - it becomes sterile, silly, and actually without substance.

Isaac Bashevis Singer
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