“The difference between literature and journalism is that journalism is unreadable and literature is not read.”

—  Oscar Wilde

Source: Miscellaneous Aphorisms; The Soul of Man

Last update Sept. 27, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The difference between literature and journalism is that journalism is unreadable and literature is not read." by Oscar Wilde?
Oscar Wilde photo
Oscar Wilde 812
Irish writer and poet 1854–1900

Related quotes

Oscar Wilde photo

“Oh! journalism is unreadable, and literature is not read.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part I

Matthew Arnold photo

“Journalism is literature in a hurry.”

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools
Cyril Connolly photo

“Literature is the art of writing something that will be read twice; journalism what will be grasped at once, and they require separate techniques.”

Cyril Connolly book Enemies of Promise

Source: Enemies of Promise (1938), Part 1: Predicament, Ch. 3: The Challenge of the Mandarins (p. 19)

Marguerite Duras photo

“I see journalists as the manual workers, the laborers of the word. Journalism can only be literature when it is passionate.”

Marguerite Duras (1914–1996) French writer and film director

Walesa's Wife, from Practicalities (1987, trans. 1990).

Irene Sabatini photo

“I think that literature, when it’s good, as opposed to journalism, gives you the freedom to be the characters, to enter into their lives, their psyche and so their experiences become, in a way, yours.”

Irene Sabatini (1967) writer from Zimbabwe

What these works of fiction have allowed me to do is to enter the pain and despair, the hope, to share in the struggles of certain characters that I have identified with (because of the artistry of the writers in making these individuals come alive).
Source: Institute of Education Alumni Life Issue 33 Summer 2010 https://www.irenesabatini.com/files/IS-Novel-Revolutionary-IOE-July-2010.pdf

“I was an English major. I studied a lot of English literature, so got interested in the literary magazine and was a contributing editor. That's the closest I got to journalism then, but I always hankered to get into news.”

Larry LeSueur (1909–2003) American journalist
Jean Cocteau photo

“After the writer’s death, reading his journal is like receiving a long letter.”

Jean Cocteau (1889–1963) French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager and filmmaker

On the journal of Franz Kafka; diary entry (7 June 1953); Past Tense: Diaries Vol. 2 (1988)

“Journalism is writing that first appears in any periodic journal.”

William Zinsser (1922–2015) writer, editor, journalist, literary critic, professor

Source: On Writing Well (Fifth Edition, orig. pub. 1976), Chapter 9, Nonfiction as Literature, p. 61.

D. V. Gundappa photo

“This [Journalism] is not a profession of my choice. Nor is it family traditional occupation. God must have created this profession as a fit theater for all my struggles…Whatever I have written so far is about politics or philosophy, literature, music, poetry or even speeches I made either in the floor of assembly or from public-platforms-all these in a way touch one aspect of journalism or the other”

D. V. Gundappa (1887–1975) Indian writer

In page=18
D.V. Gundappa,Sahitya Akademi

Samanta Schweblin photo

“I learned to write reading North American literature, I love your literature, but I have this feeling that if a country only reads its own literature, it will run out of oxygen.”

Samanta Schweblin (1978) Argentine writer

On her encouraging that Americans read literature beyond their country in “Samanta Schweblin on Revealing Darkness Through Fiction” https://lithub.com/samanta-schweblin-on-revealing-darkness-through-fiction/ in LitHub (2017 Jan 12)

Related topics