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Joseph O'Connor Quotes

Novelist

Joseph O'Connor is an Irish novelist known for his profound character portrayal and rich narrative skills. His works often explore the relationship between individuals and society, history, and memory, and are highly appreciated by readers.

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All Way Done Hope Matter Ambition August Being True Belief Best Way Bills

Famous Joseph O'Connor Quotes

“How the prisoner and the immigrant are treated by the government, how the poor are treated and those without influence: this is secretly how the government would like to treat us all.”

Government Poverty Immigrants Prisoner

Book:Star of the Sea

Source: Star of the Sea

“You write for the winds, uncorrupted by hope and untouched by hope's sibling, despair. [Bram Stoker, to Walt Whitman]”

Hope Despair

Book:Shadowplay

Source: Shadowplay

“We still tell each other that we are lucky to be alive, when our being alive has almost nothing to do with luck, but with geography, pigmentation, and international exchange rates.”

Race Class Luck

Book:Star of the Sea

Source: Star of the Sea

“That each man is the sum of his choices is nothing less than the truth. And each, perhaps, is also something else.”

Destiny Choice

Book:Star of the Sea

Source: Star of the Sea

“His father, putter in hand, on the fourteenth green at Killarney, dark glasses and spats, sunburned with August laughter”

Laughter Golf August Sunburned

Book:My Father's House

Source: My Father's House

“You don’t understand the fact that hope, if it is ever encountered, is in the small things of the everyday, not an announcement from on high. In the aroma of cooking, a phrase from Vivaldi. A handclasp. A conversation. Pg106”

Hope

Book:My Father's House

Source: My Father's House

“A religiously minded kid will often be good at lying awake all night because you need an imagination if you're going to believe.”

Faith Wwii

Book:My Father's House

Source: My Father's House

“The most important thing I would learn in school was that almost everything I would learn in school would be utterly useless. When I was fifteen I knew the principal industries of the Ruhr Valley, the underlying causes of World War One and what Peig Sayers had for her dinner every day...What I wanted to know when I was fifteen was the best way to chat up girls. That is what I still want to know.”

Source: The secret world of the Irish male

“(The short story) is a form that has all the power of the novel - some would say more - but none of the self-importance.”

Self Stories Form Novel Importance Short Story Self-importance

Author:Joseph O'Connor

“If you do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. If what you are doing is not working, do something else.”

Ifs Done Work Out Entrepreneurship

Author:Joseph O'Connor

“Love and freedom are such hideous words. So many cruelties have been done in their name.”

Has Beens Done Names Cruelty Hideous Love And Freedom

Book:Star of the Sea

Source: Star of the Sea

“Everything is in the way the material is composed.”

Way Materials

Author:Joseph O'Connor

“There is nothing worse than the ambitions of a talentless person.”

Persons Ambition

Author:Joseph O'Connor

“It is not a matter of ends justifying means: but of the creation of new means and new ends.”

Mean Ends Matter Creation

Author:Joseph O'Connor

“Politics' the polite word for antediluvian prejudices, the rags put on by enmity and tribal resentment.”

Prejudice Resentment Polite Rags Enmity

Book:Star of the Sea

Source: Star of the Sea

“Dublin was turning into Disneyland with super-pubs, a Purgatory open till five in the morning.”

Morning Five Disneyland Pubs Purgatory Dublin

Author:Joseph O'Connor

“Beliefs: Those things we hold to be true despite evidence to the contrary.”

Belief Knowledge Learning Evidence Management Contrary Despite Being True

Book:The Art of Systems Thinking: Essential Skills for Creativity and Problem Solving

Source: The Art of Systems Thinking: Essential Skills for Creativity and Problem Solving

“I feel these days like a very large flamingo. No matter what way I turn, there is always a very large bill.”

Way Feels Matter Turns Business No Matter What Bills Debt Finance These Days Flamingos

Book:The secret world of the Irish male

Source: The secret world of the Irish male

About the Author

Born: September 20, 1963
Known for: Novelist
Quotes: 18

Books & Sources

Star of the SeaRelated source material

My Father's HouseRelated source material

The secret world of the Irish maleRelated source material

ShadowplayRelated source material

The Art of Systems Thinking: Essential Skills for Creativity and Problem SolvingRelated source material

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