Novelists, ’ said Ivo, ‘are to the nineties what cooks were to the eighties, hairdressers to the seventies and pop-stars to the sixties… Merely, you know, an expression of the Zeitgeist, Nobody actually reads novels any more, but it’s a fashionable thing to be a novelist — as long as you don’t entertain people of course. I sometimes think, ’ said Ivo, his eyes like industrial diamonds, ‘that my sole virtue is, I’m the only person in London who has no intention of writing any kind of novel, ever. Amanda Craig
About This Quote

In the late 1980s, popular novelist Ivo Fest was interviewed for a newspaper. He said he thought that "novelists were to the nineties what cooks were to the eighties, hairdressers to the seventies and pop stars to the sixties – merely an expression of the Zeitgeist". The Zeitgeist, or spirit of the times, is a term referring to what is current and popular at a particular time and place. Ivo Fest was expressing his disdain for those who write books as a way to become famous. He was saying that novels are just a fad, and not actually read by anybody because so many people now write them as a way to be famous.

Source: A Vicious Circle

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