Saul Bellow Quotes
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It seems, after all that there are no nonpeculiar people.
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Art attempts to find in the universe, in matter as well as in the facts of life, what is fundamental, enduring, essential.
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Death deserves dignity.
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It's goodbye to reality when love sets in.
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I'm glad I haven't lived in vain.
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A man should be able to hear, and to bear, the worst that could be said of him.
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Fidelity is for phonographs
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I pretended not to understand. One of life's hardest jobs, to make a quick understanding slow. I think I succeeded, thought Herzog.
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All human accomplishment has the same origin, identically. Imagination is a force of nature. Is this not enough to make a person full of ecstasy? Imagination, imagination, imagination.
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I don’t actually take much stock in the collapsing culture bit. I’m beginning to see it instead as the conduct of life without input from your soul.
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The only real distinction at this dangerous moment in human history and cosmic development has nothing to do with medals and ribbons. Not to fall asleep is distinguished. Everything else is mere popcorn.
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You have one of two choices. Either you can panic and start making frantic attempts to reform under the glare of these awful critical eyes, or you can just say, "The hell with you! I know what I'm doing. If you don't yet, it's because you haven't given me an attentive reading.
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I'm afraid there's nothing we can do about the journalists; we can only hope that they will die off as the deerflies do towards the end of August.
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There is simply too much to think about.
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For the first time in history, the human species as a whole has gone into politics. Everyone is in the act, and there is no telling what may come of it.
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Anxiety destroys scale, and suffering makes us lose perspective.
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With a novelist, like a surgeon, you have to get a feeling that you've fallen into good hands - someone from whom you can accept the anesthetic with confidence.
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And what about all the good I have in my heart - does it mean anything?
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You're all alone when you're a writer. Sometimes you just feel you need a humanity bath. Even a ride on the subway will do that. But it's much more interesting to talk about books. After all, that's what life used to be for writers: they talk books, politics, history, America. Nothing has replaced that.
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A fool can throw a stone in a pond that 100 wise men can not get out.
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The best and purest human beings, from the beginning of time, have understood that life is sacred.
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Let the enemies of life step down.
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Well, everybody has a history.
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The challenge of modern freedom, or the combination of isolation and freedom which confronts you, is to make yourself up. The danger is that you may emerge from the process as a not-entirely-human creature. (Referenced in How to Lose Friends and Alienate People by Toby Young)