Great American Quotes - Page 4

• People think that they will sit down and produce the great American novel in one sitting. It doesn't work that way. This is a very patient and meticulous work, and you have to do it with joy and love for the process, not for the outcome.

  Isabel Allende

  Thinking, People, Joy

  4 Copy quote

• I've had the good fortune to read a lot of great American writers in translation, and my absolute beloved, for me one of the greatest writers ever, is Mark Twain. Yes, yes, yes. And Whitman, from whom the whole of 20th-century poetry sprung up. Whitman was the origin of things, someone with a completely different outlook. But I think that he's the father of the new wave in the world's poetry which to this very day is hitting the shore.

  Wislawa Szymborska

  Father, Thinking, Sprung Up

  5 Copy quote

• This is, if not a lifetime process, it's awfully close to it. The writer broadens, becomes deeper, becomes more observant, becomes more tempered, becomes much wiser over a period time passing. It is not something that is injected into him by a needle. It is not something that comes on a wave of flashing, explosive light one night and say, 'Huzzah! Eureka! I've got it!' and then proceeds to write the great American novel in eleven days. It doesn't work that way. It's a long, tedious, tough, frustrating process, but never, ever be put aside by the fact that it's hard.

  Rod Serling

  Writing, Night, Light

  27 Copy quote

• In general, of course, a stranger who tries to get you into an automobile is anything but noble, and in general a person who quotes great American novelists is anything but treacherous, and in general a man who says you needn't worry about money, or a man who smokes cigarettes, is somewhere in between.

  Daniel Handler

  Men, People, Worry

  4 Copy quote

• Labour day is a great American holiday that people
  celebrate by going out and buying products
  made in China

  David Letterman

  Holiday, People, Buying

  4 Copy quote

• If we must die, we die defending our rights.

  Sitting Bull

  Native American, Rights, India

  242 Copy quote

• I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place.

  Sitting Bull

  Native American, Men, White Man

  "God Is Red: A Native View of Religion". Book by Vine Deloria, Jr., 1972.

  59 Copy quote

  Show source

• America is a Nation with a mission - and that mission comes from our most basic beliefs. We have no desire to dominate, no ambitions of empire. Our aim is a democratic peace - a peace founded upon the dignity and rights of every man and woman.

  George W. Bush

  Ambition, Patriotic, Men

  Third Presidential State of the Union Address, delivered 20 January 2004

  16 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America.

  William J. Clinton

  Memorial Day, Freedom, 4th Of July

  46 Copy quote

• Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!

  Patrick Henry

  Death, Sweet, Freedom

  Speech in Virginia Convention, Richmond, Va., 23 Mar. 1775.

  127 Copy quote

  Show source

• These are the times that try men's souls.

  Thomas Paine

  Veterans Day, Time, Motivation

  The American Crisis, 19 Dec. 1776

  81 Copy quote

  Show source

• Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!

  Ronald Reagan

  Wall, Memorable, Europe

  Remarks at Brandenburg Gate, West Berlin, Germany, 12 June 1987

  95 Copy quote

  Show source

• The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Inspirational, Leadership, Bullying

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1933 See Francis Bacon 7; Montaigne 4; Thoreau 16; Wellington 3

  332 Copy quote

  Show source

• Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death.

  Rosalind Russell

  Funny, Life, Movie

  "Fictional character: Mame Dennis". "Auntie Mame", www.imdb.com. 1958.

  24 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  There is no death, only a change of worlds.

  Chief Seattle

  Change, Sympathy, Native American

  Albert Furtwangler, Chief Seattle (1997). “Answering Chief Seattle”, p.25, University of Washington Press

  138 Copy quote

  Show source

• Fischer, the great American chess champion, famously said, 'Chess is life.' I would say, 'Pi is life.'

  Daniel Tammet

  Champion, Chess, Fischer

  4 Copy quote

• When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home.

  Tecumseh

  Life, Death, Wisdom

  "A Sourcebook for Earth's Community of Religions". Book by Joel Diederik Beversluis, 1993.

  215 Copy quote

  Show source

• In 2009, South Carolina was blessed to welcome a great American company that chose to stay in our country to continue to do business. That company was Boeing.

  Nikki Haley

  Country, Blessed, South Carolina

  Nikki Haley RNC speech, www.politico.com. August 29, 2012.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Ladies and gentlemen, my mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you!

  George M. Cohan

  Movie, Thank You, Mother

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

  79 Copy quote

  Show source

• Ivan and Misha is the great American Russian Novel told as Chekhov would tell it, in stories of delicacy, humanity, and insight. From Kiev to Manhattan, Brighton Beach and Bellevue, Michael Alenyikov lays out a series of compelling arguments for brotherhood between brothers, between lovers, between men from an old country. Alenyikov confronts big subjects—illness and madness, sex and love in the age of AIDS, old and new world values, a fallen wall, the metaphysics of survival, the march of generations.

  Carolyn Cooke

  Country, Beach, Brother

  7 Copy quote

• If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place. He put in your heart certain wishes and plans, and in my heart he put other and different desires. It is not necessary for eagles to be crows.

  Sitting Bull

  Native American, Heart, Men

  "I have spoken; American history through the voices of the Indians". Book by Virginia Armstrong, Chicago, Sage Books, 1971.

  216 Copy quote

  Show source

• The trap into which all writers have, will, or should fall into, of writing The Great American Watchamacallit, is such an uncluttered and inviting one that from time to time I'm sure even the greatest have to pull themselves up short by the Shift key to remind themselves that it is story first that they should write.

  Harlan Ellison

  Fall, Writing, Keys

  4 Copy quote

• As far as I'm concerned, blues and jazz are the great American contributions to music.

  Edgar Winter

  Jazz, Blues Music, Contribution

  16 Copy quote

• If the white man wants to live in peace with the Indian, he can live in peace. There need be no trouble. Treat all men alike. give them all the same law. Give them all an even chance to live and grow.

  Chief Joseph

  Native American, Men, White

  Lincoln Hall Speech in Washington D.C., January 14, 1879.

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• I am big. It's the pictures that got small.

  Billy Wilder

  Movie, Great Year, Hollywood Films

  Billy Wilder (1999). “Sunset Boulevard”, p.22, Univ of California Press

  20 Copy quote

  Show source