Roger Zelazny Quotes

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Roger Zelazny

Profession : Writer

Birth : May 13, 1937

In a sense, fantasy is a freer play of the imagination. You can achieve exactly the situation you want with less groundwork, less of a need to fill in all of the background. For science fiction, I would use a lot of sources to set up, for instance, what a being from another planet would be like.

Roger Zelazny

I care more, and I think readers do also, for characters in a state of transformation.

Roger Zelazny

While I had often said that I wanted to die in bed, what I really meant was that in my old age I wanted to be stepped on by an elephant while making love.

Roger Zelazny

Space opera was the sort of story on which I grew up. When I was younger, I read heavily in pulp magazines. They were readily available in the stores.

Roger Zelazny

I try to sit down at the typewriter four times a day, even if it's only five minutes, and write three sentences.

Roger Zelazny

Robots are very tricky to design and expensive, whereas humans are cheaply manufactured. Humans can handle things with greater manual dexterity than most robots I've known.

Roger Zelazny

It's hard not to be a part of your time.

Roger Zelazny

I am fascinated, I suppose, by a flawed man with a streak of greatness.

Roger Zelazny

The places where I have the nameless character in 'My Name Is Legion' meet his boss are real places I've been to. That works well for tax purposes, writing into my stories the places I've actually visited.

Roger Zelazny

I got the idea for my novel 'Lord of Light' when I cut myself shaving just before I was to go on a panel at a convention. I had to go out there with this big gash in my face. I remember that I thought, 'I wish I could change bodies.'

Roger Zelazny

When you are about to die, a wombat is better than no company at all.

Roger Zelazny

I read poetry every day. I look at it as an exercise, a kind of T'ai Chi for writers. It teaches economy of form.

Roger Zelazny

I always wanted to write, ever since I was a kid. I started writing at the age of 11. All I wanted to do was finish my education and have my nights free for writing.

Roger Zelazny

Ultimately, you've got to have something to say, so a writer should continue learning things throughout life. But I don't think education makes one a writer.

Roger Zelazny

I find fantasy easier to write. If I'm going to write science fiction, I spend a lot more time thinking up justifications. I can write fantasy without thinking as much. I like to balance things out: a certain amount of fantasy and a certain amount of science fiction.

Roger Zelazny

Columbia University in 1959 had a kind of reputation that interested me.

Roger Zelazny

In the Soviet Union, you always have the feeling someone is watching you.

Roger Zelazny

I enjoy travel very much. I've taken the kids to Europe when there were just the two boys.

Roger Zelazny

The first time I met Harlan Ellison, we were both unpublished young punks in Cleveland, Ohio.

Roger Zelazny

I read Herman Hesse's 'Siddhartha' while I was writing 'Lord of Light' along with many other things. It seemed a good time to read it so I could see what he had to say about Buddha. In my first chapter, I was thinking in terms of the big battle scene in the 'Mahabarata.' It helped me in visualizing the battle in my novel.

Roger Zelazny