Home / Quotes / Quote by William Saroyan

Quote by William Saroyan

“You must not be unkind, especially when it happens that you're right.”

Author

William Saroyan was an American playwright and novelist known for his humorous and satirical style. His works often explored social and human issues from the perspective of Armenian-American individuals. more

“Because immigrants have always been particularly prone to repetition - it's something to do with that experience of moving from West to East or East to West or from island to island. Even when you arrive, you're still going back and forth; your children are going round and round. There's no proper term for it - original sin seems too harsh; maybe original trauma would be better.”

Children Stills Seems Would Be Moving Term Sin Originals West Rounds Trauma East Your Children Islands Immigrants Harsh Repetition Back And Forth Original Sin

Book:White Teeth

Source: White Teeth

“...despite all this, it is still hard to admit that there is no one more English than the Indian, no one more Indian than the English. There are still young white men who are angry about that; who will roll out at closing time into the poorly lit streets with a kitchen knife wrapped in a tight fist. But it makes an immigrant laugh to hear the fears of the nationalist, scared of infection, penetration, miscegenation, when this is small fry, peanuts, compared to what the immigrant fears - dissolution, disappearance.”

Source: White Teeth

“It wasn't like the spare rooms of immigrants - packed to the rafters with all that they have ever possessed, no matter how defective or damaged, mountains of odds and ends - the stand testament to the fact that they have things now, where before they had nothing.”

Ends Matter Facts Rooms Mountain Immigrants Possessed Odds Spares Testament Defective Rafters Odds And Ends

Book:White Teeth

Source: White Teeth

“Death would be a complete knowingness, but what frightened him was this: not knowing beforehand what it was he would know.”

Knows Would Be Knowing Frightened Not Knowing

Book:Half of a Yellow Sun

Source: Half of a Yellow Sun

“You couldn't make yourself stop feeling a certain way, no matter what the other person did. You had to just wait. Eventually the feeling went away because others came along. Or sometimes it didn't go away but got squeezed into something tiny, and hung like a piece of tinsel in the back of your mind.”

Way Life Mind Persons Sometimes Matter Feelings Certain Waiting Pieces No Matter What Tiny Going Away Hung Tinsel

Author:Elizabeth Strout

“She says it's really not very flattering to her that the women who fall in love with her husband are so uncommonly second-rate.”

Fall Husband Falling In Love Rate Flattering Second Rate

Author:W. Somerset Maugham

“You are part of my existence, part of myself. You have been in every line I have ever read, since I first came here, the rough common boy whose poor heart you wounded even then. You have been in every prospect I have ever seen since-on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the streets. You have been the embodiment of every graceful fancy that my mind has ever become acquainted with.”

“I'm afraid you've thought me a bigger fool than I am.”

Fool Bigger

Book:The Painted Veil

Source: The Painted Veil

“A bird in the hand was worth two in the bush, he told her, to which she retorted that a proverb was the last refuge of the mentally destitute.”

Two Hands Lasts Bird Refuge Destitute

Author:W. Somerset Maugham

Quote by William Saroyan

Author

You May Also Like