Sherman Alexie Quotes

All I try to do is portray Indians as we are, in creative ways. With imagination and poetry. I think a lot of Native American literature is stuck in one idea: sort of spiritual, environmentalist Indians. And I want to portray everyday lives. I think by doing that, by portraying the ordinary lives of Indians, perhaps people learn something new.

Sherman Alexie

• People
• Trying
• Imagination
• Spiritual
• Literature
• Creative
• Everyday

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Quotes to Explore

• Exposure to a diversity of disciplines has been exceptionally helpful to me.

  

  Irene Rosenfeld
  • Me
  • Diversity
  • Helpful

• I actually buy the paper version of The New York Times maybe once or twice a week.

  

  Nate Silver
  • New
  • New York
  • Week

• I get most of my inspiration from older records. Most of the records that I listen to were probably made before I was born, and I was born in the mid-'70s. I don't know why, exactly, I'm drawn to those sounds.

  

  M. Ward
  • Inspiration
  • Records
  • Sounds

• I took on cancer like I take on everything - like a mission and a job to accomplish.

  

  Sam Taylor-Johnson
  • Job
  • Cancer
  • Mission

• If I was doing a musical, I would never listen to the cast album, because I wanted to do my version of something.

  

  J. K. Simmons
  • Never
  • Doing
  • Listen

• Without literature my life would be miserable.

  

  Naguib Mahfouz
  • Life
  • Literature
  • My Life

• I always direct next to the camera and watch my actors, and so you can see the small things that you can't see on the small screen but you can definitely see on the big screen.

  

  F. Gary Gray
  • Small
  • Camera
  • Small Things

• Young people who are just starting out somehow need to let you know they know how to sing.

  

  Barbara Cook
  • People
  • Know
  • Starting

• 'Undertones of War' by Edmund Blunden seems to get less attention than the memoirs of Siegfried Sassoon and Robert Graves, but it is a great book.

  

  Pat Barker
  • Great
  • Book
  • War

• Teach for America recruits top recent college grads, young professionals, people we believe are the U.S.'s most promising future leaders, and asks them to commit two years to teach in high-need urban and rural communities.

  

  Wendy Kopp
  • People
  • Believe
  • America

• I have done my time living on the run. I'm British and I want to come home.

  

  Gary Glitter
  • Time
  • Done
  • Home

• I've had a long line of failed television programs, pilots that were never picked up, series that didn't go very long. I've learned that there's really nothing you can do. If it's not in my control, I try not to worry about it.

  

  Nathan Fillion
  • Up
  • Long
  • Control

• If I'm chartering in and out and flying home after I play, that doesn't make sense. But where we can bus, then we'll bring the family out and spend time with them during the day.

  

  Zac Brown Band
  • Time
  • Family
  • Home

• I believe I and all the Chinese people have such a conviction that China will make continuous progress and the people's wishes for and needs for democracy and freedom are irresistible.

  

  Wen Jiabao
  • People
  • Believe
  • Freedom

• This is the sense of the desert hills, that there is room enough and time enough.

  

  Mary Hunter Austin
  • Time
  • Desert

• I have always wanted to play Sweeney in 'Sweeney Todd.'

  

  Jason Alexander

• I was one of those people at one point who was scared to put my foot down and show where the boundaries were. For me, it's really important to stand your ground and know exactly what you are, where you wanna be, and what you're doing, or else people are gonna try you.

  

  Kali Uchis
  • People
  • Important

• Christmas is, for those who wish to follow the way of Jesus, an invitation to accept into our comfortable and safe lives those who come to us from far away, who seem ragged, marginal, in transition.

  

  Jay Parini
  • Wish
  • Jesus
  • Christmas

• We're seeking out such grossness in human behavior and want such mindless entertainment. 'The Real Housewives of Atlanta' and some of these other shows are more racist. Or '16 and Pregnant.' Getting rewarded for being pregnant when you're a teenager? Are you serious?

  

  Chelsea Handler
  • Real
  • Serious
  • Teenager

• But men must know, that in this theatre of man's life it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on.

  

  Francis Bacon
  • Life
  • God
  • Men

• Science rushes headlong, without selectivity, without 'taste,' at whatever is knowable, in the blind desire to know all at any cost. Philosophical thinking, on the other hand, is ever on the scent of those things which are most worth knowing, the great and the important insights.

  

  Friedrich Nietzsche
  • Great
  • Thinking
  • Important

• I think everything has to come from something that you feel comfortable with and want to be in and sometimes we try to negotiate that limit, but it's not always easy to find the right balance.

  

  Caroline Dhavernas
  • Thinking
  • Trying
  • Sometimes

• If I'm listening to country, it's Hank Williams, George Jones, Merle Haggard and stuff like that. If people out there don't take that stuff seriously, well, they just haven't listened to it and don't know what they're talking about.

  

  Buzz Osborne
  • People
  • Country
  • Listening

• All I try to do is portray Indians as we are, in creative ways. With imagination and poetry. I think a lot of Native American literature is stuck in one idea: sort of spiritual, environmentalist Indians. And I want to portray everyday lives. I think by doing that, by portraying the ordinary lives of Indians, perhaps people learn something new.

  

  Sherman Alexie
  • People
  • Trying
  • Imagination