“Fearlessness in those without power is maddening to those who have it.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“When we are green, still half-created, we believe that our dreams are rights, that the world is disposed to act in our best interests, and that falling and dying are for quitters. We live on the innocent and monstrous assurance that we alone, of all the people ever born, have a special arrangement whereby we will be allowed to stay green forever”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“Knowing that everything comes to an end is a gift of experience, a consolation gift for knowing that we ourselves are coming to an end. Before we get it we live in a continuous present, and imagine the future as more of that present. Happiness is endless happiness, innocent of its own sure passing. Pain is endless pain.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“I was giving up--being realistic, as people liked to say, meaning the same thing. Being realistic made me feel bitter.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“Why were Jack and his brother digging post holes? A fence there would run parallel to the one that already enclosed the farmyard. The Welches had no animals to keep in or out - a fence there could serve no purpose. Their work was pointless. Years later, while I was waiting for a boat to take me across the river, I watched two Vietnamese women methodically hitting a discarded truck tire with sticks. They did it for a good long while, and were still doing it when I crossed the river. They were part of the dream from which I recognized the Welches, my defeat-dream, my damnation-dream, with its solemn choreography of earnest useless acts.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“And in my heart I despised the life I led in Seattle. I was sick of it and had no idea how to change it. I thought that in Chinook, away from Taylor and Silver, away from Marian, away from people who had already made up their minds about me, I could be different. I could introduce myself as a scholar-athlete, a boy of dignity and consequence, and without any reason to doubt me people would believe I was that boy, and thus allow me to be that boy. I recognized no obstacle to miraculous change but the incredulity of others. This was an idea that died hard, if it ever really died at all.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“Happiness is endless hapiness, innocent of its own sure passing. Pain is endless pain.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“I've allowed some of these points to stand, because this is a book of memory, and memory has its own story to tell. But I have done my best to make it tell a truthful story.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“I recognized no obstacle to miraculous change but the incredulity of others. This was an idea that died hard, if it ever really died at all.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“It was like fishing a swamp, where you feel the tug of something that at first seems promising and then resistant and finally hopeless as you realize that you've snagged the bottom, that you have the whole planet on the other end of your line.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“Want! You must want something. What do you want?”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
“And I learned that it's a bad idea to curse if you're in trouble, but a good idea to sing, if you can.”
― Tobias Wolff, quote from This Boy's Life
Tobias Wolff
Born place: in Birmingham, Alabama, The United States
Born date June 19, 1945
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“Perhaps animals are smarter than men, he thought, taking only what they need to live today leaving something for tomorrow.”
― Patrick D. Smith, quote from A Land Remembered
“He sat at his desk – last seat, last row – and looked at the chart on the wall next to him. Of course there was no gold star next to his name. He had already done three things wrong: First, he had knocked over a girl and made her cry. Second, he was late getting back to class. And third and worst of all, his name was Bradley Chalkers. As long as his name was Bradley Chalker's, he'd never get a gold star. They don't give gold stars to monsters.”
― Louis Sachar, quote from There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom
“You don’t have to, Jessica,” my mother said softly as she sat in a seat by the bed. She gave me a sad little smile. Her eyes were pooled with tears that hadn’t left since she got that call”
― Keary Taylor, quote from Branded
“The ground on which you once stood is cut away. You have become a citizen of No Man’s Land. I send you my greetings.
-- the closing lines of Smiley's letter to Karla persuading him to defect.”
― John le Carré, quote from Smiley's People
“There's a joke people tell in the Soviet Union: Mitterrand, Bush and Gorbachev have a meeting with God. Mitterrand says, 'My country faces many difficult problems-- lagging exports, Muslim minorities, European unification. How long will it be before France's problems are solved?' God says, 'Fifteen years.' Mitterrand begins to cry. 'I'm an old man,' says Mitterrand. 'I'll be dead by then. I'll never see France's problems solved.' Then Bush says, 'My country faces many difficult problems-- recession, crime, racial prejudice. How long will it be before America's problems are solved?' God says, 'Ten years.' Bush begins to cry. 'I'm an old man,' says Bush. 'I'll be out of office by then. I won't get any credit for solving America's problems.' Then Gorbachev says, 'My country faces many, many difficult problems. How long will it be before the Soviet Union's problems are solved?' God begins to cry.”
― P.J. O'Rourke, quote from Give War a Chance: Eyewitness Accounts of Mankind's Struggle Against Tyranny, Injustice, and Alcohol-Free Beer
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Been Down So Long it...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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