Daniel Kehlmann Quotes
I wanted to write a book that would leave open many riddles and mysteries, even to me. Of course in some cases I do know the answers, but in many others I don't know and don't want to know.
Quotes to Explore
-
I never took hallucinogenic drugs because I never wanted my consciousness expanded one unnecessary iota.
-
Why do elites hate the poor? It's xenophobia. They don't know any poor people - except their off-the-books Brazilian nanny and illegal immigrant cleaning lady from Upper Revolta who don't speak English.
-
I definitely love Australia. I've been to Sydney and Melbourne a couple of times, and I love those places.
-
A dinner invitation, once accepted, is a sacred obligation. If you die before the dinner takes place, your executor must attend.
-
The GOP is broken. They need a Bill Clinton moment with someone to figure things out. Let me just say - and I don't agree with his policies, so let me put a warning label on the side of the packet here - If George W. Bush had never gotten in the disastrous Iraq war, he was trying to modernize the party on a series of fronts.
-
Are you used to entertaining everyone with your tales of drama and conflict? Do you get attention and feel important every time you complain about how awful this man is? Stop settling for attention for the negative stuff in your life.
-
The gravest risks from al Qaeda combine its affinity for big targets and its announced desire for weapons of mass destruction.
-
Reading galleys on the subway is the closest the publishing industry comes to having a standardized mating call.
-
The American people need to know the truth. The American people need to see the truth. In a democracy, letting the people know the truth is the essence of what it means to be free.
-
When people hear good music, it makes them homesick for something they never had, and never will have.
-
I was one of those girls in class who always had her hair in plaits, was always with the boys, always playing football in the street.
-
It's hard to be serious in life.
-
For women to achieve equal representation in leadership roles, it's important that they have the backing of men as well as women.
-
My parents never told me to get a real job. They always said, 'Go for it! If this is what you want to do, work hard.' They were always very supportive.
-
Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.
-
It will take a long time for women's effect on politics to register so that we may properly appraise it.
-
I'm Glad that the Bush years are behind us
-
There is an enormous pressure placed on gay novelists because they are the only spokespeople. The novelist's first obligation is to be true to his own vision, not to be some sort of common denominator or public relations man to all gay people.
-
My voice is rather quirky. It's abysmally low. People often think I'm putting it on at first. Think drunk Darth Vader. Or Barry White singing country. It suits my dark material. When I do readings, I really play it up and go subterranean. I can make the phone book sound terrifying.
-
The story follows the whole family. But pretty much all the characters who are in jail have written a book about it, so you've got their perspective of it, however skewed they want you to see it.
-
Health is a matter of choice, not a mystery of chance.
-
During these two and a half years that have followed the war, the most urgent problem we have encountered was: to activate the public enterprises, to bring them up to the level that international markets demand and we are just now getting them prepared for privatization.
-
I never see a novel as a film while I'm writing it. Mostly because novels and films are so different, and I'm such an internal novelist.
-
I wanted to write a book that would leave open many riddles and mysteries, even to me. Of course in some cases I do know the answers, but in many others I don't know and don't want to know.
