“Novelist: Telling lies for fun and profit.”
“The difference between a novelist and a historian is this: that the former tells lies deliberately and for the fun of it; the historian tells lies and imagines he is telling the truth.”
“...he was after all, a novelist...and a novelist was simply a fellow who got paid to tell lies. The bigger the lies, the better the pay.”
“To tell you the truth. I am a wild and passionate novelist. I am therefore easily given over to telling wild and passionate lies.”
“The novelist's business is lying.”
“No, Paul, I couldn't care less if you tell me made-up stories. Our lies reveal as much about us as our truths.' (Said to Paul by Elizabeth Costello, the interloping novelist-angel-inner voice).”