Dissertation Quotes

• I spent every night until four in the morning on my dissertation, until I came to the point when I could not write another word, not even the next letter. I went to bed. Eight o'clock the next morning I was up writing again.

  Abraham Pais

  Morning, Writing, Night

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• I once asked a young dissertation writer whether her suddenly grayed hair was due to ill health or personal tragedy; she answered: “It was the footnotes”.

  Joanna Russ

  Hair, Ill Health, Tragedy

  Joanna Russ (1983). “How to Suppress Women's Writing”, p.137, University of Texas Press

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• The first point was we wanted power to determine our own destiny in our own black community. And what we had done is, we wanted to write a program that was straightforward to the people. We didn't want to give a long dissertation.

  Bobby Seale

  Writing, Destiny, Long

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• I am so fond of tea that I could write a whole dissertation on its virtues. It comforts and enlivens without the risks attendant on spirituous liquors. Gentle herb! Let the florid grape yield to thee. Thy soft influence is a more safe inspirer of social joy.

  James Boswell

  Writing, Yield, Joy

  James Boswell (1956). “London Journal, 1762-1763, as First Published in 1950 from the Original Manuscript”

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• My early work and publications centered around expanding on the analysis of life insurance in my dissertation and its relationship to investment banking.

  Douglass North

  Relationship, Analysis, Banking

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• An American cannot converse, but he can discuss, and his talk falls into a dissertation. He speaks to you as if he was addressing a meeting; and if he should chance to become warm in the discussion, he will say 'Gentlemen' to the person with whom he is conversing.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  War, Fall, Gentleman

  Alexis de Tocqueville (2001). “Democracy in America”, p.102, Penguin

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• The true source of our sufferings has been our timidity.

  John Adams

  Suffering, Source, Has Beens

  John Adams (2001). “The Political Writings of John Adams”, p.15, Regnery Publishing

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• The rites of passage in the academic world are arcane and, in their own way, highly romantic, and the tensions and unplesantries of dissertations and final oral examinations are quickly forgotten in the wonderful moment of the sherry afterward, admission into a very old club, parties of celebration, doctoral gowns, academic rituals, and hearing for the first time "Dr.," rather than "Miss" Jamison.

  Kay Redfield Jamison

  Party, Missing, Examination

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• Yo! You’re my dope dealer not my thesis adviser. If I wanted your opinion about my dissertation, I’d have asked for it, Motherfucker!

  Mark Leyner

  Dope, Opinion, Wanted

  Mark Leyner (2011). “The Tetherballs of Bougainville: A Novel”, p.19, Vintage

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• If you don't have the willpower to stop eating carbs, you won't have the willpower to do a dissertation. #truth.

  Geoffrey Miller

  Willpower, Eating, Carbs

  "Geoffrey Miller, Visiting NYU Professor, Slammed For Fat-Shaming Obese PhD Applicants" By Meredith Bennett-Smith, www.huffingtonpost.com. June 4, 2013.

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• I hate set dissertations,--and above all things in the world, 'tis one of the silliest things in one of them, to darken your hypothesis by placing a number of tall, opake words, one before another, in a right line, betwixt your own and your readers conception.

  Laurence Sterne

  Hate, Numbers, Obscurity

  Laurence Sterne (1849). “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman”, p.151

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• And if something should be found, particularly in the first part of the dissertation, that one is generally not accustomed to come across in scholarly writings, the reader must forgive my jocundity, just as I, in order to lighten the burden, sometimes sing at my work.

  Soren Kierkegaard

  Work, Writing, Order

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• nothing is so pleasant ... as to display your worldly wisdom in epigram and dissertation, but it is a trifle tedious to hear another person display theirs.

  Ouida

  Wit, Trifles, Bores

  Ouida (1870). “Puck: His Vicissitudes, Adventures, Observations, Conclusions, Friendships, and Philosophies”, p.131

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• History is life; he who has not lived, or has lived only enough to write a doctoral dissertation, is too inexperienced with life to write good history.

  Louis Moreau Gottschalk

  Writing, History, Enough

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• In poetry, and in my study in graduate school, I was drawn to a particular poet, Theodore Roethke. I did a dissertation on "The Evolution of Matter and Spirit in the Poetry of Theodore Roethke" for my Ph.D.

  Frederick Lenz

  School, Matter, Rama

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• Dissertations are not finished; they are abandoned.

  Fred Brooks

  Abandoned, Finished

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• The history of any private family, however humble, could it be fully related for five or six generations, would illustrate the state and progress of society better than the most elaborate dissertation.

  Robert Southey

  Humble, Progress Of Society, Six

  Robert Southey (1865). “The Doctor, Etc”, p.31

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• As president of the American Historical Association, I started a programme to make dissertations into e-books in 1999. Before I knew it, I was involved in other electronic projects. Harvard invited me to become director of the libraries in 2007.

  Robert Darnton

  Book, Historical, President

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• For the individual, as I can testify, a brief grounding in semantics, besides making philosophy unreadable, makes unreadable most political speeches, classical economic theory, after-dinner oratory, diplomatic notes, newspaper editorials, treatises on pedagogics and education, expert financial comment, dissertations on money and credit, accounts of debates, and Great Thoughts from Great Thinkers in general. You would be surprised at the amount of time this saves.

  Stuart Chase

  Philosophy, Political, Speech

  Stuart Chase (2015). “Tyranny of Words”, p.15, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Over the past decade I have watched many friends go through graduate school and write dissertations. Through that process, I have seen how they are guided by mentors to understand particular norms within their disciplines and to learn about what they can and cannot, should and should not say, and which ideas can go together and which cannot. I never went through this process.

  Dean Spade

  Writing, School, Past

  "On Normal Life". Interview with Natalie Oswin, societyandspace.org. January 15, 2014.

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• I mean, '8 ½' to me is such a great dissertation on the whole, you know, act of filmmaking and creativity.

  Baz Luhrmann

  Creativity, Mean, Filmmaking

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• History shows us a lot of things. It shows why the Lord's Prayer includes the supplication: "And lead us not into temptation." In my day, dissertations were still written by hand, or drummed out with a typewriter. In the past, you had to round up the literature, find the books and find the passages. Nowadays you click on Wikipedia or Google and you have everything you need. This probably makes it more difficult to resist temptation.

  Wolfgang Schauble

  Prayer, Book, Past

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• Not everybody is talented for doing research. I think many women prefer to look for an easier job after their dissertations because it is very demanding. You have to be mobile. You have to move to different places for your post-doc training. And if you aren't successful, it isn't a very pleasant job, either.

  Christiane Nusslein-Volhard

  Jobs, Moving, Successful

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• I'm not writing a Ph.D. Dissertation.

  Bill O'Reilly

  Writing

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• Second, they [those who disagree with market efficiency] always claim they know a man, a bank, or a fund that does do better. Alas, anecdotes are not science. And once Wharton School dissertations seek to quantify the performers, these have a tendency to evaporate into the air - or, at least, into statistically insignificant t-statistics.

  Paul Samuelson

  School, Men, Air

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