“The permanent temptation of life is to confuse dreams with reality. The permanent defeat of life comes when dreams are surrendered to reality.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“I can no longer take war or promotion or big income or a large house seriously. I reject empire and Vietnam and placing a man on the moon. I deny time payments and looking like the girl next door and church weddings and a great deal more. If you want to blame such rejection on grass, you can do so. I charge it to awakening.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“Don't put off what you can do today because if you enjoy it today you can do it again tomorrow.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“They’ll hear about your husband’s fortune. The suitors will begin to gather, and I want you to promise me this. Whenever one of them proposes, as they will, Doris must say rapturously, ‘Oh, David! All my life I’ve wanted to live in Israel.’ When he hears that she intends to live there instead of bringing him to the United States, you’ll see his interest evaporate. I said evaporate. It vanishes.” He waved his hands violently back and forth across his face to indicate total abolishment.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“The Arabs can lose every war, if only they win the last one.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“The Arabs can lose every war, if only they win the last one. The Jews have gained nothing if they win all the wars but lose the last one.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“Negroes were drafted, white men weren’t; the poor were hauled off to war, the rich weren’t; the stupid were shot at, the bright boys weren’t.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“A sensible man never brags about two things. How lovable his first wife was and how good his last school was.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“She was always pleased when a young man said “I can’t” rather than “I won’t,” because the former indicated a moral conviction that could not be set aside, whereas the latter implied mere personal preference without a solid footing.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“It's the good minds that find difficulty in committing themselves”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“Tanks are nothing unless they’re kept moving. Because if you leave them static, a determined team can destroy them every time.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
“In this country we get stuck with taxes, but in the old country we used to get stuck with bayonets.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Drifters
James A. Michener
Born place: in New York, New York, The United States
Born date February 3, 1907
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“John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no REASON to suffer, and that satisfies him.”
― Charlotte Perkins Gilman, quote from The Yellow Wall-Paper
“He stared down at me with a strange look on his face and did something I never thought Connor Black would do. He laid down beside me and looked up at the sky. I looked over at him as he struggled to keep his eyes open as the rain pelted him in the face; a small smile crossed my lips.
“Why are you doing this?” he asked as he turned and looked at me.
“Cause I can lay here and no one will know I’m crying.”
― Sandi Lynn, quote from Forever Black
“The Odd Couple. Is this that one where the one guy is a mess and the other is a neat freak?”
“Yes, it is.”
“And you are?”
“A mess.” Then he looked at the book in my hands. “Oh, you mean in the play? I’m the neat freak. Felix.”
― Kasie West, quote from The Fill-In Boyfriend
“How far we all come. How far we all come away from ourselves. So far, so much between, you can never go home again. You can go home, it's good to go home, but you never really get all the way home again in your life. And what's it all for? All I tried to be, all I ever wanted and went away for, what's it all for?”
― James Agee, quote from A Death in the Family
“I’m so sorry. I love you. Please forgive me. Can’t live without you.”
― J.R. Ward, quote from Father Mine
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The Madness Undernea...BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
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