Saul Bellow Quotes
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It is wrong to turn a man (a subject) into a thing (an object). By means of spiritual dialogue, the I-It relationship becomes an I-Thou relationship. God comes and goes in man's soul. And men come and go in each other's souls. Sometimes they come and go in each other's beds, too.
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Socrates said there were only two possibilities. Either the soul is immortal or, after death, things would be again as blank as they were before we were born.
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My face too blind, my mind too limited, my instincts too narrow. But this intensity, doesn't it mean anything?
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In every community there is a class of people profoundly dangerous to the rest. I don't mean the criminals. For them we have punitive sanctions. I mean the leaders. Invariably the most dangerous people seek the power. While in the parlors of indignation the right-thinking citizen brings his heart to a boil. (p. 51)
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The main reason for rewriting is not to achieve a smooth surface, but to discover the inner truth of your characters.
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There was a disturbance in my heart, a voice that spoke there and said, I want, I want, I want! It happened every afternoon, and when I tried to suppress it it got even stronger.
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We are always looking for the book it is necessary to read next.
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There's a kind of emptiness at the center of life ... nothing to form your life on, or by.
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Great pressure is brought to bear to make us undervalue ourselves. On the other hand, civilization teaches that each of us is an inestimable prize. There are, then, these two preparations: one for life and the other for death. Therefore we value and are ashamed to value ourselves.
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Americans must be the most sententious people in history. Far too busy to be religious, they have always felt that they sorely needed guidance.
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It's not up to me ... to make the world consistent.
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Whoever wants to reach a distant goal must take small steps.
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I love solitude, but I prize it most when plenty of company is available.
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When we ask for advice, we are usually looking for an accomplice.
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... an era of turmoil and ideological confusion, the principal phenomenon of the present age.
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Certain blood will be given for half certain reasons, as in all wars.
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A good novel is worth more then the best scientific study.
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With one long breath, caught and held in his chest, he fought his sadness over his solitary life. Don't cry, you idiot! Live or die, but don't poison everything.
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California is like an artificial limb the rest of the country doesn't really need. You can quote me on that.
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De Tocqueville considered the impulse toward well-being as one of the strongest impulses of a democratic society. He can't be blamed for underestimating the destructive powers generated by this same impulse.
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A novel is balanced between a few true impressions and the multitude of false ones that make up most of what we call life.
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No realistic, sane person goes around Chicago without protection.
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I feel that art has something to do with the achievement of stillness in the midst of chaos. A stillness which characterizes prayer, too, and the eye of the storm. I think that art has something to do with an arrest of attention in the midst of distraction.
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Socrates said the unexamined life is not worth living. But the over-examined life makes you wish you were dead. Given the alternative, I'd rather be living.