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Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut Quotes

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Famous Kurt Vonnegut Quotes

“Her face ... was a one-of-a-kind, a surprising variation on a familiar theme - a variation that made observers think, Yes - that would be another very nice way for people to look. What Beatrice had done with her face, actually, was what any plain girl could do. She overlaid it with dignity, suffering, intelligence, and a piquant dash of bitchiness.”

PeopleThinkingWayLooksKindMadeDoneWould BeFacesSufferingGirlNiceDignityFamiliarThemeSurprisingObserversVariationVery NiceOne Of A Kind
Author:Kurt Vonnegut
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“I think about my education sometimes. I went to the University of Chicago for awhile after the Second World War. I was a student in the Department of Anthropology. At that time they were teaching that there was absolutely no difference between anybody. They may be teaching that still. Another thing they taught was that no one was ridiculous or bad or disgusting. Shortly before my father died, he said to me, ‘You know – you never wrote a story with a villain in it.’ I told him that was one of the things I learned in college after the war.”

ThinkingKnowsWorldMaySaidStillsWarSometimesStoriesFatherDifferencesTeachingStudentsTaughtCollegeDiedUniversityRidiculousWar Of The WorldsDepartmentChicagoVillainWorld War IDisgustingAnthropologySecond World WarFather DiedMy Father Died
Book:SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE
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“There was a message written in pencil on the tiles by the roller towel. This was it: What is the purpose of life? Trout plundered his pockets for a pen or pencil. He had an answer to the question. But he had nothing to write with, not even a burnt match. So he left the question unanswered, but here is what he would have written, if he had found anything to write with: To be the eyes and ears and conscience of the Creator of the Universe, you fool.”

IfsWritingEyePurposeUniverseFoundLeftAnswersWrittenFoolMessagesConscienceEarsCreatorPocketsPensPurpose Of LifePencilsTroutTowelsUnansweredTilesWhat Is The Purpose Of Life
Author:Kurt Vonnegut
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“Since there is no one else to praise me, I will praise myself -- will say that I have never tampered with a single tooth in my thought machine, such as it is. There are teeth missing, God knows -- some I was born without, teeth that will never grow. And other teeth have been stripped by the clutchless shifts of history -- But never have I willfully destroyed a tooth on a gear of my thinking machine. Never have I said to myself, 'This fact I can do without.”

ThinkingKnowsHas BeensSaidI CanFactsGrowsCan DoBornMissingMachinesPraiseTeethDestroyedMy ThoughtsGod KnowsGearsMother Night
Author:Kurt Vonnegut
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“When I used to teach creative writing, I would tell the students to make their characters want something right away - even if it's only a glass of water. Characters paralyzed by the meaninglessness of modern life still have to drink water from time to time.”

IfsWantWritingStillsCharacterUsedWaterTeachCreativeModernStudentsDrinkGlassesCreative WritingWant SomethingModern LifeParalyzedMeaninglessnessDrink Water
Book:Palm Sunday: An Autobiographical Collage
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“Billy covered his head with his blanket. He always covered his head when his mother came to see him in the mental ward - always got much sicker until she went away. It wasn’t that she was ugly, or had bad breath or a bad personality. She was a perfectly nice, standard-issue, brown-haired, white woman with a high school education. She upset Billy simply by being his mother. She made him feel embarrassed and ungrateful and weak because she had gone through so much trouble to give him life, and to keep that life going, and Billy didn’t really like life at all.”

GivingFeelsMadeSchoolMotherWhiteGoneIssuesNiceTroublePersonalityStandardsHigh SchoolWeakBreathsUglyUpsetBrownCoveredEmbarrassedBlanketUngratefulSchool EducationBad Breath
Author:Kurt Vonnegut
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“I have this disease late at night sometimes, involving alcohol and the telephone. I get drunk, and I drive my wife away with a breath like mustard gas and roses. And then, speaking gravely and elegantly into the telephone, I ask the telephone operators to connect me with this friend or that one, from whom I have not heard in years.”

YearsSometimesNightAsksWifeHeardDiseaseLateBreathsRoseMy WifeAlcoholDrunkGasTelephonesInvolvingOperatorsMustardMustard Gas
Book:Slaughterhouse-five, Or, The Children's Crusade: A Duty-dance with Death
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