Colson Whitehead Quotes
In the 1930s, the government paid writers to interview 80- and 90-year-old former slaves, and I read those accounts. I came away realizing - not surprisingly - that many slave masters were sadists who spent a lot of time thinking up creative ways of hurting people.Colson Whitehead
Quotes to Explore
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Amazon is holding its own because the service it provides - offering millions of books and other items quickly and easily from home at any hour of the day or night - is a real one, and one that was impossible before there was an Internet.
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I debated free trade in college. I came out as a free trader. I'm a free markets guy. I'm an Adam Smith guy.
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The ruling ideas of each age have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.
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Great leaders have a heart for people. They take time for people. They view people as the bottom line, not as a tool to get to the bottom line.
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You'll be fooled if you only get your hip-hop from the mainstream, you know. The things that move people are not just found in the mainstream cultures. And when we talk about hip-hop in general, hip-hop's basically preoccupied with life.
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Without vanity, without coquetry, without curiosity, in a word, without the fall, woman would not be woman. Much of her grace is in her frailty.
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I spent years studying the teachings of Patanjali, and he reminded us several thousand years ago that when we are steadfast - which means that we never slip in our abstention of thoughts of harm directed toward others - then all living creatures cease to feel enmity in our presence.
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How accurately can the law fix the crime? There has to be a mechanism for very fast action. The law is like this: catch them and punish them.
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It's nice for me to be in touch with a younger generation.
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I changed that system in Florida when I was the Speaker of the House - I was the Minority Leader; I saw for 16 years the way a power system works.
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I'm not slim. I'm a curvy girl: I've got thighs and a bum. I don't mind baring the fact that I've got a bit of cellulite because everybody has. I find it off-putting when everybody on telly is the same size or looks the same build. For me, it's important for people to watch someone normal.
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Music is pretty intimate stuff and I can only work with very few people: Gonzalez being one, Mocky being another and, on a completely different level, Broken Social Scene. With Broken Social Scene it's not one-on-one, it's a one-on-12. It's very healthy, very comfortable, like a big pot luck supper among old friends.
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In the British Special Air Service, combat fitness is all about running.
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I went to high school in New York City. So, I grew up in New Jersey my whole life, and I was watching all the people and all the kids that I met there become so jaded.
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Life is an adventure, it's not a package tour.
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When I was young I thought that money was the most important thing in life; now that I am old I know that it is.
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My mission is to support our service members. They're volunteers, and if they're going to go to a hostile place like Afghanistan, I think we owe it to them to back them up and try to help them get through it.
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Our pluralist society must provide its citizens with the tools to understand religions, their symbols and their practices.
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I think this dichotomy or opposition between work and play, between leisure and serious stuff, is definitely a bad way of thinking about the useful insights that play provides.
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Time be thine, And thy best graces spend it at thy will.
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It's nice when people are happy to hear that you're still alive, rather than feeling like "Oh, finally he's dead?"
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I really don't believe in magic.
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If the opportunities are not being presented to me, I'm going to take the reins and do it. Brit Marling was not waiting for the phone to ring. The great roles are not there to be had. If you have an idea, do it.
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In the 1930s, the government paid writers to interview 80- and 90-year-old former slaves, and I read those accounts. I came away realizing - not surprisingly - that many slave masters were sadists who spent a lot of time thinking up creative ways of hurting people.
Colson Whitehead
