P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

Detroit's industrial ruins are picturesque, like crumbling Rome in an 18th-century etching.

Quotes to Explore
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I've always been an independent person, but that independence was in the setting of security.
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Large audiences did not suit my low-key approach.
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Movies are a director's medium, and they end up getting less credit than actors. They get the flak if the movie doesn't do well, and the actor walks away with most of the credit if the film does well.
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When I was in college, I studied business because I thought I wanted to be a director and producer.
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Michael Jordan changed so much in basketball, he took his power to make a difference. It's so much going on in music right now and somebody has to make a difference.
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I grew up in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, and reading was a big part of my life - I'd get through several books a week.
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I worked on the line, I've been an executive chef, I've worked for the Mets, I've worked for various steakhouses, vegetarian restaurants, a lot of Middle Eastern stuff. I've worked my fair share of a lot of different things. I've worked at festivals and street fairs, you know? I've been through it all.
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After 'Lindbergh,' my publisher asked whom I wanted to write about next. I said, 'There's one idea I've been carrying in my hip pocket for 35 years. It's Woodrow Wilson.'
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I mean, I think we're put here on earth to make your own destiny, to begin with. I don't think there's anything you can do this way or that way to change anything.
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I love red or deep purple lips for events.
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I want minimum information given with maximum politeness.
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On June 23, 1864, Ambrose Bierce was in command of a skirmish line of Union soldiers at Kennesaw Mountain in northern Georgia. He'd been a soldier for three years and, in that time, had been commended by his superiors for his efficiency and bravery during battle.
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You know, we're really destroying ourselves because we're really making the motivating force of anything we do selfish.
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I depend on good editors and a good director.
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Discipline is wisdom and vice versa.
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I don't want to spoil the magic, but it's a very curious thing that honestly baffles me. It's the nearest we'll ever get to playing God, to suddenly produce these fully formed creatures. It is a bit odd. Other aspects you work out more - you rework sentences, you rework imagery. But not characters.
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There are so many different sub-societies inside of Syria.
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If you do not love me I shall not be loved If I do not love you I shall not love.
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My mother is the reason I'm in fashion. She worshiped it. Unfortunately, she infected me.
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An author's ability to bring a marketing synopsis to the table - along with a great manuscript - makes a difference in what books get picked up. This is true for both fiction and nonfiction titles. You need to show your publisher what you've got in your marketing arsenal.
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Everything is a narrative in life. I learned that early on as a reporter at the 'Washington Post.'
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I started out as a Democrat.
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Its subtlest, most appealing accomplishment may be in how other characters respond to Gregorius' precipitous swerve onto the spiritual path. (...) That said, Night Train to Lisbon is a very long, ambitious book that's feverishly overwritten. (...) Think of W.G. Sebald recast for the mass market: stripped of nuance, cooked at high temperature and pounded home, clause after clause. Some of the clumsiness derives from Barbara Harshav's inelegant translation -- we're often aware of her struggle -- but she can't be blamed for the pervasive bloat.
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Detroit's industrial ruins are picturesque, like crumbling Rome in an 18th-century etching.