Joshua Ferris Quotes

United States, Author
November 8, 1974

Joshua Ferris is an American author best known for his debut 2007 novel Then We Came to the End. The book is a comedy about the American workplace, told in the first-person plural. It takes place in a fictitious Chicago ad agency that is experiencing a downturn at the end of the '90s Internet boom.

We suffered failures of imagination just like everyone else, our daring was wanting, and our daily contentment too nearly adequate for us to give it up.

Joshua Ferris
Without work, so much of one's identity just evaporates.

Joshua Ferris
- Work
- Identity
- Evaporates

I know what to do with my life. I just don't know what to do with this one night.

Joshua Ferris
- Life
- Night
- To Do
I think it's a very bad idea for someone to start writing for a readership.

Joshua Ferris
- Writing
- Idea
- Readership
Everything was always something but something – and here was the rub – could never be everything.

Joshua Ferris
- Everything
- Something
- Rub
It is forgivable to say nothing out of ignorance; it's inexcusable to remain silent once awareness dawns.

Joshua Ferris
All broken hearts are circumstantial. Every lovelorn jerk is the victim of bad timing, good intentions, and someone else’s poor decision making.

Joshua Ferris
We had the great good fortune and shortcomings of character that marked every generation that had never seen war.

Joshua Ferris
- War
- Fortune
- Seen

The main questions of everyday life are too enormous to answer in any definitive sense.

Joshua Ferris
- Sense
- Questions
- Answer
I wake up every day in order to do something that's quixotic, and not necessarily called for in the world, but I do it because there's extraordinary meaning for me behind the effort.

Joshua Ferris
- World
- Effort
- Meaning