Quotessence
Home / Authors / Tom Wolfe
Tom Wolfe

Tom Wolfe Quotes

Author

Filter quotes by topic

AllPeopleWorldLonelinessMenThinkingWayFirstsHumansKnowsKool Aid

Famous Tom Wolfe Quotes

“Seven thousand of them were indicted and arraigned, and then they entered the maw of the criminal justice system—right here—through the gateway into Gibraltar, where the vans were lined up. That was about 150 new cases, 150 more pumping hearts and morose glares, every week that the courts and the Bronx County District Attorney's Office were open. And to what end? The same stupid, dismal, pathetic, horrifying crimes were committed day in and day out, all the same. What was accomplished by assistant D.A.'s, by any of them, through all this relentless stirring of the muck? The Bronx crumbled and decayed a little more, and a little more blood dried in the cracks. The Doubts! One thing was accomplished for sure. The system was fed, and those vans brought in the chow.”

WealthPovertyNew YorkCriminal Justice
Author:Tom Wolfe
Create image

“The ambitious artist, the artist who wanted Success, now had to do a bit of psychological double-tracking. Consciously he had to dedicate himself to the antibourgeois values of the cenacles of whatever sort, to bohemia, to the Bloomsbury life, the Left Bank life, the Lower Broadway Loft life, to the sacred squalor of it all... Not only that, he had to dedicate himself to the quirky god Avant-Garde. He had to keep one devout eye peeled for the new edge on the blade of the wedge of the head on the latest pick thrust of the newest exploratory probe of this fall's avant-garde Breakthrough of the Century ... all this in order to make it, to be noticed, to be counted, within the community of artists themselves. What is more, he had to be sincere about it. At the same time he had to keep his other eye cocked to see if anyone in le monde was watching. Have they noticed me yet? Have they even noticed the new style (that me and my friends are working in) Don't they even know about Tensionism (or Slice Art or Niho or Innerism or Dimensional Creamo or whatever)? (Hello, out there!) ... because as every artist knew in his heart of hearts, no matter how many times he tried to close his eyes and pretend otherwise (History! History!-where is thy salve?), Success was real only when it was success within le monde. He could close his eyes and try to believe that all that mattered was that he knew his work was great ... and that other artists respected it ... and that History would surely record his achievements ... but deep down he knew he was lying to himself. I want to be a Name, goddamn it!”

ArtCriticism
Book:The Painted Word
Create image

“Sir Gerald Moore: I was at dinner last evening, and halfway through the pudding, this four-year-old child came alone, dragging a little toy cart. And on the cart was a fresh turd. Her own, I suppose. The parents just shook their heads and smiled. I've made a big investment in you, Peter. Time and money, and it's not working. Now, I could just shake my head and smile. But in my house, when a turd appears, we throw it out. We dispose of it. We flush it away. We don't put it on the table and call it caviar.”

BusinessDisappointmentMentorMentorsWall Street
Book:The Bonfire of the Vanities
Create image

“Laurie piped up again. 'At State, everybody calls diversity dispersity. What happens is, everybody has their own clubs, their own signs, their own sections where they all sit in the dining hall--all the African Americans are over there? . . . and all the Asians sit over't these other tables? -- except for the Koreans? -- because they don't get along with the Japanese so they sit way over there? Everybody's dispersed into their own little groups -- and everybody's told to distrust everybody else? Everybody's told that everybody else is trying to screw them over--oops!' -- Laurie pulled a face and put her fingertips over her lips -- 'I'm sorry!' She rolled eyes and smiled. 'Anyway, the idea is, every other group is like prejudiced against your group, and no matter what they say, they're only out to take advantage of you, and you should have nothing to do with them -- unless your white, in which case all the others are not prejudiced against you, they're like totally right, because you really are a racist and everything, even if you don't know it? Everybody ends up dispersed into their own like turtle shells, suspicious of everybody else and being careful not to fraternize with them. Is it like that at Dupont?”

CollegeDiversityPrejudiceMulticulturalismMulticulturalWhite PrivilegeRacial PrejudiceCollege LifeRacial TensionMicroagressions
Book:I Am Charlotte Simmons
Create image

“The simple truth is that the Web the Internet, does one thing. It speeds up the retrieval and dissemination of information, partially eliminating such chores as going outdoors to the mailbox or the adult bookstore, or having to pick up the phone to get hold of your stockbroker or some buddies to shoot the breeze with. That one thing the Internet does, and only that. All the rest is Digibabble.”

TechnologyComputersThe InternetComputers Internet
Book:Hooking Up
Create image

“Le parole sono una forma elementare di mnemonica: una sequenza di suoni (l’alfabeto) usati per ricordare qualsiasi cosa, dalla più piccola alla più grande. Il linguaggio è, in sostanza, il ricorso a queste particolari mnemotecniche – le parole – per creare significato. E il parlare altro non è che un sistema ... mnemonico: un sistema che ha permesso all’Homo sapiens di assumere il controllo dell’intero mondo. È il linguaggio, e il linguaggio soltanto, con la sua mnemonica, che crea la memoria nel momento in cui l’Homo sapiens ne fa esperienza. Persino le scimmie più intelligenti non hanno pensieri, al massimo reazioni condizionate a certe pressioni primordiali, primi fra tutti il bisogno di cibo e il timore di fronte a minacce fisiche. Si badi bene, però, che la mnemonica non è semplicemente al servizio del linguaggio: la mnemonica è il linguaggio. Per tutta la storia del parlare umano – ed è irrilevante azzardare le solite congetture paleontologiche riguardo la sua datazione – l’uomo ha convertito oggetti, azioni, pensieri, concetti ed emozioni in codici chiamati convenzionalmente parole. Oggi nessuno sa – e non c’è ragione di ritenere che qualcuno avrà mai buone probabilità di saperlo – quando sia accaduto all’Homo sapiens di usare le parole come mnemonica, ma attualmente vi sono in tutto il mondo sei-settemila sistemi mnemonici diversi, meglio noti come lingue. Questi, e questi soli, sono il linguaggio. Semplici e chiari. Potrà anche essere divertente starsene a guardare individui, peraltro di comprovata intelligenza, spaccarsi il cranio contro lo stesso firewall: intere mandrie, intere generazioni, ere, età, un intero, luminoso firmamento di individui... Ma fino a quando?”

WolfeParola
Book:Il regno della parola
Create image

“The congressmen in the room just wanted to see them, to use their position to arrange a personal audience, to gaze upon them with their own eyes across the committee table, no more than four feet away, to shake hands with them, occupy the same space on this earth with them for and hour or so, fawn over them, pay homage to them, bathe in their magical aura, feel the radiation of their righteous stuff, salute them, wish upon them the smile of God...”

GovernmentGreatnessGloryAstronautSpace RaceThe Right StuffTom Wolfe
Book:The Right Stuff
Create image

“[H]e could see the island of Manhattan off to the left. The towers were jammed together so tightly, he could feel the mass and stupendous weight.Just think of the millions, from all over the globe, who yearned to be on that island, in those towers, in those narrow streets! There it was, the Rome, the Paris, the London of the twentieth century, the city of ambition, the dense magnetic rock, the irresistible destination of all those who insist on being where things are happening-and he was among the victors!”

PowerDreamsNew YorkParisNew York CityRomeTowersManhattanDensityIslandVictorBuildings1980sSkyscrapers
Book:The Bonfire of the Vanities
Create image

“But by now, he figured, there must be thousands of men like him, rich businessmen who over the past ten or fifteen years had divorced their old wives of two to three decades’ standing and taken on new wives, girls a whole generation younger. And what did all the experts have to say about these irresistible little morsels? Nothing! What if a man goes through all that, the separation, the divorce, all that agony, that struggle, that hellish expense, that…that…. that guilt…and one day, or one night, he wakes up and wonders, Who the hell is this in the bed next to me? Why is she here? Where did she come from? What does she want? Why won’t she leave? That they don’t tell you about.”

LoveMarriageSecond Wife
Book:A Man in Full (Hardcover) By Tom Wolfe Plus 2 Free Hardcovers: Hooking up and I Am Charlotte Simmons
Create image

“His hair has the long jesuschrist look. He is wearing the costume clothes. But most of all, he now has a very tolerant and therefore withering attitude toward all those who are still struggling in the old activist political ways...while he, with the help of psychedelic chemicals, is exploring the infinite regions of human consciousness.”

WayHumansLooksLongStillsHelpingPoliticalConsciousnessAttitudeStruggleHairDrugClothesInfiniteRegionsActivistChemicalsExploringCostumesHippiePsychedelicHuman ConsciousnessWithering
Author:Tom Wolfe
Create image

“Sherman made the terrible discovery that men make about their fathers sooner or later.”

MenInspirationalMadeFatherDadTerribleDiscoveryMy DadSooner Or LaterFatherhoodFathers DayProtectorBeing A FatherGreat FatherBonfireHappy First Fathers DayFathers Day InspirationalHappy Fathers Day GodGreat DadInspirational FatherLove My DadHappy Fathers Day GreetingsPerhaps LoveFatherhood Inspirational
Book:The Bonfire of the Vanities: A Novel
Create image