Manuel Puig quotes

Manuel Puig was an influential Argentinian author and screenwriter, renowned for his innovative narrative style and exploration of popular culture. His novels, such as "Kiss of the Spider Woman" and "Betrayed by Rita Hayworth," have captivated international audiences with their unique blend of melodrama and social commentary. He remains a pivotal figure in Latin American literature, celebrated for his bold experimentation and literary contributions. Here are 64 of his quotes:

The translator's task is to create, in his or her own language, the same tensions appearing in the original. That's hard!

Manuel Puig

If it's great stuff, the people who consume it are nourished. It's a positive force.

Manuel Puig

I write for somebody who has my own limitations. My reader has a certain difficulty with concentrating, which in my case comes from being a film viewer.

Manuel Puig

I like the beauty of Faulkner's poetry. But I don't like his themes, not at all.

Manuel Puig

Modern American cinema seems to me superficial. The intention is to understand a certain reality, and the result is nothing but a photographing of that reality.

Manuel Puig

It's essential not to have an ideology, not to be a member of a political party. While the writer can have certain political views, he has to be careful not to have his hands tied.

Manuel Puig

It's my own personal unconscious that ultimately creates the novel's aesthetic facade.

Manuel Puig

I felt the need to tell stories to understand myself.

Manuel Puig

Your reality, isn't restricted by this cell we live in. If you read something, if you study something, you transcend any cell you're inside of.

Manuel Puig

The nicest thing about feeling happy is that you think you'll never be unhappy again.

Manuel Puig

Ironically, Latin American countries, in their instability, give writers and intellectuals the hope that they are needed.

Manuel Puig

I didn't choose literature. Literature chose me. There was no decision on my side.

Manuel Puig

As a rule, one should never place form over content.

Manuel Puig

For someone who writes fiction, in order to activate the imagination and the unconscious, it's essential to be free.

Manuel Puig

In a country like France, so ancient, their history is full of outstanding people, so they carry a heavy weight on their back. Who could write in French after Proust or Flaubert?

Manuel Puig

Book reviews have never helped me. Most of them erred in their interpretations and their work has been a waste of time.

Manuel Puig

I began teaching in New York because I needed to stay in the United States and didn't have my immigration papers in order, so working for a university was a way of resolving the issue.

Manuel Puig

If a spectator with a philosophical mind, somebody accustomed to reading books, gets the same kind of information in a movie, he might not fully understand it.

Manuel Puig

Writers are not meant for action.

Manuel Puig

My pleasure was to copy, not to create.

Manuel Puig

I think cinema is closer to allegories than to reality. It's closer to our dreams.

Manuel Puig

Tardiness in literature can make me nervous.

Manuel Puig