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Quotes by Writer
"Without aggression, it becomes possible to think well, to be curious about differences, and to enjoy each other's company."
46
"You come in off the street, through the doors of the theater. You sit down. The lights go down and the curtain goes up. And you're in another world."
46
"A kitten is chiefly remarkable for rushing about like mad at nothing whatever, and generally stopping before it gets there."
46
"There are people who can never forgive a beggar for their not having given him anything."
46
"Today we are less likely to speak of humanitarianism, with its overtones of paternalistic generosity, and more likely to speak of human rights. The basic freedoms in life are not seen as gifts to be doled out by benevolent well-wishers, but as Casement said at his trial, as those rights to which all human beings are entitled from birth. It is this spirit which underlies organizations like Amnesty International, with its belief that putting someone in prison solely for his or her opinion is a crime, whether it happens in China or Turkey or Argentina and Medecins Sans Frontieres, with its belief that a sick child is entitled to medical care, whether in Rwanda or Honduras or the South Bronx."
46
"I want my word to be up to the scale of the feat of arms performed by the Russian soldier."
46
"A reputation for a thousand years may depend upon the conduct of a single moment."
46
"There are a lot of people who write very intensely about things they do not and cannot do."
46
"It makes you feel good to know that there's other people afflicted like you."
46
"What kills us isn't one big thing, but thousands of tiny obligations we can't turn down for fear of disappointing others."
46
"Random violence is incredibly infectious."
46
"After all it is those who have a deep and real inner life who are best able to deal with the irritating details of outer life."
46
"Look at all the things that can go wrong for men. There's the nothing-happening-at-all problem, the too-much-happening-too-soon problem, the dismal-droop-after-a-promising-beginning problem; there's the size-doesn't-matter-except-in-my-case problem, the failing-to-deliver-the-goods problem, and what do women have to worry about? A handful of cellulite? Join the club. A spot of I-wonder-how-I-rank? Ditto."
46
"A German immersed in any civilization different from his own loses a weight equivalent in volume to the amount of intelligence he displaces."
46
"When you read a great book, you don't escape from life, you plunge deeper into it. There may be a superficial escape " into different countries, mores, speech patterns " but what you are essentially doing is furthering your understanding of life's subtleties, paradoxes, joys, pains and truths. Reading and life are not separate but symbiotic."
46
"In French literature, you can choose a la carte; in Spanish literature, there is only the set meal."
46
"There are certain words which are nearer and dearer to a man than any others."
46
"It is easier for a man to be loyal to his club than to his planet; the bylaws are shorter, and he is personally acquainted with the other members."
Man,
46
"I've wanted to see beyond the Western, mechanical view of the world and see what else might appear when the lens was changed."
46
"The old know what they want; the young are sad and bewildered."
46
"If your head tells you one thing, and your heart tells you another, before you do anything, you should first decide whether you have a better head or a better heart."
46
"I have friends who read my books in Greek."
46
"It's extremely seldom that anybody wants me to change what I've written about them. Generally I portray them in a good light, if they're friends."
46
"Political people don't solve stuff - not really. Political people are like guys in pop music."
46
"Kant and Hegel are interesting thinkers. But I am happy to insist that they are also terrible writers."
46
"CORE was committed to nonviolence, but I was not."
46
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