Sherman Alexie Quotes
That's one more thing people don't know about Indians: We love to talk dirty.
Sherman Alexie
Quotes to Explore
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I don’t want long hair, I don’t want short hair, I don’t want hair at all, and I don’t want to be a girl or a boy. I want to be a yellow and orange leaf some little kid picks up and pastes in his scrapbook.
Sherman Alexie
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I thought I’d been condescended to as an Indian - that was nothing compared to the condescension for writing Y.A.
Sherman Alexie
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He made me realize that hard work--that the act of finishing, of completing, of accomplishing a task--is joyous
Sherman Alexie
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I got in a fight with my girlfriend," I said. "I was just driving around, blowing off steam, you know?" Well, you should be more careful where you drive," the officer said. "You're making people nervous. You don't fit the profile of the neighborhood." I wanted to tell him that I didn't fit the profile of the country but I knew it would just get me into trouble.
Sherman Alexie
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When I had no money, and a great book came out, I couldn't get it. I had to wait. I love the idea that I have hardcover books here and at home that I haven't read yet. That's how I view that I'm rich. I have hardcover books I may never read.
Sherman Alexie
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If you really want a woman to love you, then you have to dance. And if you don’t want to dance, then you’re going to have to work extra hard to make a woman love you forever, and you will always run the risk that she will leave you at any second for a man who knows how to tango.
Sherman Alexie
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I draw because words are too unpredictable. I draw because words are too limited. If you speak and write in English, or Spanish, or Chinese, or any other language, then only a certain percentage of human beings will get your meaning. But when you draw a picture everybody can understand it. If I draw a cartoon of a flower, then every man, woman, and child in the world can look at it and say, "That's a flower.
Sherman Alexie
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My career means, if you're a non-Indian writing about Indians, at least there's one Indian in your rearview mirror.
Sherman Alexie
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But something magical happened to me when I went to Reardan. Overnight I became a good player. I suppose it had something to do with confidence. I mean, I'd always been the lowest Indian on the reservation totem pole - I wasn't expected to be good so I wasn't. But in Reardan, my coach and the other players wanted me to be good. They needed me to be good. They expected me to be good. And so I became good. I wanted to live up to the expectations. I guess that's what it comes down to. The power of expectations. And as they expected more of me, I expected more of myself, and it just grew and grew.
Sherman Alexie
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I'm not a pacifist by any measure, but I'm also fully aware that the reasons I might go to war could be very dubious.
Sherman Alexie
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I believe in any kid's ability to read any book and form their own judgements. It's the job of a parent to guide his/her child through the reading of every book imaginable. Censorship of any form punishes curiosity.
Sherman Alexie
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Life is a constant struggle between being an individual and being a member of the community.
Sherman Alexie
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Like officer Dave.He's never said much about his life, but I can tell he's scarred. And he knows I'm scarred too. The wounded always recognize the wounded. We can smell each other.
Sherman Alexie
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And none of these people, not one of them, had loved any of the others well enough. Failures, he thought, we're all failures... He wanted his love to be the wine and bread, and the blood and flesh. He reached for her, a dangerous stranger in a city of dangerous strangers, but she turned away from him and walked unsteadily through the crowd. How many loveless people walk among the barely loved?
Sherman Alexie
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Nostalgia is always doomed and dooming.
Sherman Alexie
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Writing is a lonely business.
Sherman Alexie
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Unlike landed white men, she didn't need to climb mountains to experience mystic panic. All she needed was to set her alarm dock for the next morning, wake when it rang, and go to class.
Sherman Alexie
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"I used to think the world was broken down by tribes," I said. "By black and white. By Indian and white. But I know that isn't true. The world is only broken into two tribes: The people who are assholes and the people who are not."
Sherman Alexie
