Thornton Wilder

Playwright, Novelist, Poet

Thornton Wilder was an American playwright and novelist, best known for his play 'Our Town,' which explores themes of life and human connection.

Born
April 17, 1897
Died
December 7, 1975
Quotes
139
Rank
#565

Quote collection

Thornton Wilder quotes (page 5 of 7)

139 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.

Thornton Wilder Playwright, Novelist, Poet
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"She had never realized any love save love as passion. Such love, though it expends itself in generosity and thoughtfulness, though it give birth to visions and to great poetry, remains among the sharpest expressions of self-interest. Not until it has passed though a long servitude, though its own self-hatred, though mockery, though great doubts, can it take its place among the loyalties. Many who have spent a lifetime in it can tell us less of love than the child that lost a dog yesterday."

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"I am not interested in the ephemeral - such subjects as the adulteries of dentists. I am interested in those things that repeat and repeat and repeat in the lives of the millions."

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Thornton Wilder Playwright, Novelist, Poet
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"The difference between a little money and no money at all is enormous-and can shatter the world. And the difference between a little money and an enormous amount of money is very slight-and that, also, can shatter the world."

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"The theatre is supremely fitted to say: 'Behold! These things are.' Yet most dramatists employ it to say: 'This moral truth can be learned from beholding this action.'"

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Thornton Wilder Playwright, Novelist, Poet
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"I rose by sheer military ability to the rank of corporal."

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"I was an old man when I was 12; and now I am an old man, AND IT'S SPLENDID!"

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"The planting of trees is the least self-centered of all that we can do. It is a purer act of faith than the procreation of children."

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"When you're at war, you think about a better life; when you're at peace you think about a more comfortable one."

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"Every writer is necessarily a critic - that is, each sentence is a skeleton accompanied by enormous activity of rejection; and each selection is governed by general principles concerning truth, force, beauty, and so on. The critic that is in every fabulist is like the iceberg - nine-tenths of him is under water."

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"Never support two weaknesses at the same time. It's your combination sinners - your lecherous liars and your miserly drunkards - who dishonor the vices and bring them into bad repute."

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"We live in what is, but we find a thousand ways not to face it. Great theater strengthens our faculty to face it."

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"Only it seems to me that once in your life before you die you ought to see a country where they don't talk in English and don't even want to."

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"But there comes a time in everybody's life when he must decide whether he'll live among human beings or nota fool among fools or a fool alone."

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"There's nothing like mixing with women to bring out all the foolishness in a man of sense."

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"I think I write in order to discover on my shelf a new book that I would enjoy reading, or to see a new play that would engross me."

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"Everybody's talking about people breaking into houses but there are more people in the world who want to break out of houses."

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"On the stage it is always now; the personages are standing on that razor-edge, between the past and the future, which is the essential character of conscious being."

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"The best part of married life is the fights. The rest is merely so-so."

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"[Whenever] you get near the human race, there's layers and layers of nonsense."

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"Oh, earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you."

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