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Tennessee Williams

Tennessee Williams Quotes

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Famous Tennessee Williams Quotes

“The human heart would never pass the drunk test.... If you took the human heart out of the human body and put a pair of legs on it and told it to walk a straight line, it couldn't do it.”

IfsHumansHeartBodyLinesWalksTestsLegsDrunkPairsHuman HeartHuman BodyStraight Lines
Book:Plays: 1957-1980: Orpheus descending. Suddenly last summer. Sweet bird of youth. Period of adjustment. The night of the iguana. The eccentricities of a nightingale. The milk train doesn't stop here anymore. The mutilated. Kingdom of earth (The seven descents of Myrtle). Small craft warnings. Out cry. Vieux Carré. A lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur
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“Q.Do you have any positive message, in your opinion? A.Indeed I do think that I do. Q.Such as what? A.The crying, almost screaming, need of a great worldwide human effort to know ourselves and each other a great deal better, well enough to concede that no man has a monopoly on right or virtue any more than any man has a corner on duplicity and evil and so forth. If people, and races and nations, would start with that self-manifest truth, then I think that the world could sidestep the sort of corruption which I have involuntarily chosen as the basic, allegorical theme of my plays as a whole.”

PeopleIfsThinkingKnowsMenWorldNeedsHumansWellsSelfEnoughPlayWholeEvilNationsDealsEffortRaceOpinionVirtueCryMessagesCorruptionCornersChosenThemeManifestMonopolyDuplicityPositive Messages
Book:New Selected Essays: Where I Live
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“Of course you always had that detached quality as if you were playing a game without much concern over whether you won or lost, and now that you've lost the game, not lost but just quit playing, you have that rare sort of charm that usually only happens in very old or hopelessly sick people, the charm of the defeated.”

PeopleIfsHappensCoursesGamesLostQualityConcernSickQuittingCharmDefeatedDetachedCat On A Hot Tin Roof
Book:The Theatre of Tennessee Williams
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“The panic disappeared under those soothing old fingers and the breathing slowed down and stopped hurting the chest as if a fox was caught in it, and then at last Mr. Kroger began to lecture the boy as he used to, Pablo, he murmured, don't ever be so afraid of being lonely that you forget to be careful. Don't forget that you will find it sometimes but other times you won't be lucky, and those are the times when you have got to be patient, since patience is what you must have when you don't have luck.”

IfsSometimesLastsUsedHurtForgetBoysLuckyLonelyPatienceDown AndLuckFingersPatientCaughtCarefulBreathingChestsBe CarefulPanicFoxesBe PatientLecturesSoothingBeing Lonely
Book:Tales of Desire (New Directions Pearls)
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“The nervous system of any age or nation is its creative workers, its artists. And if that nervous system is profoundly disturbed by its environment, the work it produces will inescapably reflect the disturbances, sometimes obliquely and sometimes with violent directness.”

IfsSometimesAgeArtistNationsCreativeEnvironmentProduceWorkersTheatreViolentNervousCraftsWorking ItDisturbedNervous SystemDisturbanceCreative Work
Book:New Selected Essays: Where I Live
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“What shouldn't you do if you're a young playwright? Don't bore the audience! I mean, even if you have to resort to totally arbitrary killing on stage, or pointless gunfire, at least it'll catch their attention and keep them awake. Just keep the thing going any way you can.”

IfsWayWritingMeanYoungAttentionAudienceStageKillingAwakeBoresArbitraryResortsPlaywrightPointless
Book:Conversations with Tennessee Williams
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