"It's almost as if we're put here on earth to show how silly they aren't."
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Quote collection
Russell Hoban quotes (page 2 of 2)
40 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"Me, what's that after all? An arbitrary limitation of being bounded by the people before and after and on either side. Where they leave off I begin, and vice versa."
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"Who is Alice?" asked mother. "Alice is somebody that nobody can see," said Frances. "And that is why she does not have a birthday. So I am singing Happy Thursday to her." - Frances the badger"
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"Sometimes there's nothing but Sundays for weeks on end. Why can't they move Sunday to the middle of the week so you could put it in the OUT tray on your desk?"
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"I have no wisdom and nothing useful to tell you - I only mentioned this because it came into my head."
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"The sign said 'The Green Turtle, Chelonia myadas, is the source of turtle soup....' I am the source of William G. soup if it comes to that. Everyone is the source of his or her kind of soup. In a town as big as London, that's a lot of soup walking around."
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"A family is everybody all together."
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"A map is the dead body of where you've been. A map is the unborn baby of where you're going. There are no maps. Maps are pictures of what isn't."
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"There is a tiger in my room,' said Frances. 'Did he bite you?' said Father. 'No,' said Frances. 'Did he scratch you?' said Mother. 'No,' said Frances. 'Then he is a friendly tiger,' said Father. 'He will not hurt you. Go back to sleep."
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"Life is a process of one goneness after another."
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"Is there an existence that is only mine?"
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"My generation was somewhat between things, neither free nor much supported by whatever held us in."
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"Usually my starting point is something that I've seen. It might be a painting, it might be an object. But they always start from a definite sensory experience."
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"Fidelity is a matter of perception; nobody is unfaithful to the sea or to mountains or to death: once recognized they fill the heart."
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"If reality had a stage door I'd hang around there to see what comes out after the show."
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"I'll never retire. They'll have to take my computer out of my cold, dead hands. I'm addicted to writing. I feel physically unwell if I'm not doing it."
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"I'd always assumed I was the central character in my own story, but now it occured to me I might in fact be only a minor character in someone else's."
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"Time's arrow, we are told, is a one-way thing. . . Memory's arrow, like the needle of a compass too close to a lodestone, spins in all directions."
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"The first thing I would say to young writers is, "Don't do it, unless you can't stand not to do it." And the second thing I would say is, "If you do do it, and get into it, the constant rule you should have in mind is to explore your material." It sounds simple, but it isn't, because people often want to get from A to B, and they don't stop to look at what is in the material."
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"When I write a book, I don't have a plan or an outline. The characters move the action, and the action develops the characters. When I write a book, I become an actor, really, taking the role of the person who is speaking or acting at the time, and so their reactions to whatever they see are my reactions."
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