Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Kurt Vonnegut

Quote by Kurt Vonnegut

“Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them - in order that the reader may see what they are made of. Words to live by... muah ha ha!”

Quote by Kurt Vonnegut

Create image

Author

Kurt Vonnegut
Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut was an American writer known for his unique humor and profound satire. His works often explore themes of war, humanity, society, and politics. His most famous works include 'Slaughterhouse-Five' and 'Cat's Cradle'. His writing style has been widely appreciated by readers and has had a profound impact on literature. more

You May Also Like

“I bet it was also the triumphant Aha! and not the truth itself that had fueled all those famous literary detectives I knew not much about except their names - Philip Marlowe, Sherlock Holmes, Joe and Frank Hardy. I felt like yelling something celebratory on my way home, something like, Yeah! or Fuck, yeah! just like Marlowe would have yelled, just like the Hardys would have yelled, and maybe Holmes, too, although maybe that's why he kept Watson around; to tell Holmes to simmer down and not get too far ahead of himself.”

YeahTriumphantSherlock HolmesAha MomentJohn WatsonPhilip MarloweAhaFrank HardyFuck YeahJoe HardyLiterary DetectivesSimmer DownThe Hardy Boys
Book:An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England
Create image

“Suddenly, far off at sea, I perceived a black speck on the steel-gray ocean. I turned at once and my heart began to beat wildly. When I forced myself to look, the black speck had disappeared. I was on the point of shouting, of stupidly calling for help, when I saw it again. It was one of those bits of refuse that ships leave behind them. Yet I had not been able to endure watching it; for I had thought at once of a drowning person. Then I realized, as calmly as you resign yourself to the idea the truth of which you have long known, that that cry which had sounded over the Seine behind me years before had never ceased, carried by the river to the waters of the Channel, to travel throughout the world, across the limitless expanse of the ocean, and that it had waited for me there until the day I had encountered it. I realized likewise that it would continue to await me on seas and rivers, everywhere, in short where lies the bitter water of my baptism. Here, too, by the way, aren't we on the water? On this flat, monotonous, interminable water whose limits are indistinguishable from those of the land? Is it credible that we shall ever reach Amsterdam? We shall never get out of this immense holy-water font. Listen. Don't you hear the cries of invisible gulls? If they are crying in our direction, to what are they calling us? But they are the same gulls that were crying, that were already calling over the Atlantic the day I realized definitively that I was not cured, that I was still cornered and that I had to make shift with it. Ended the glorious life, but ended also the frenzy and the convulsions. I had to submit and admit my guilt. I had to live in the little-ease.”

HealingRealizationExistentialismAha Moment
Book:The fall
Create image

“As a rule, we humans don’t care much about spectacle - what we care about is ecstatic understanding: in other words, cognitive ecstasy, that can be defined as electrifying cerebration of extreme psychical pleasure when we master a skill or learn something new, feeding our imagination. This ‘cogno-ecstasis’ can give us goosebumps of intellectual rapture of 'aha moment,' or puts us in motivational overdrive, otherwise known as the ‘flow state.”

Imagination QuotesFlow StateAha MomentCerebrationCognitive EcstasyCogno EcstasisMotivational Overdrive
Book:TECHNOCULTURE: The Rise of Man
Create image

“The word no is like an asset in a metaphorical bank account where our life’s energy is the holding. Use it to save, and use it to earn a greater sense of yourself, what’s important to you, and where you want to spend your time and energy.”

Inspirational QuotesLife QuotesTime ManagementBurnoutHolistic WealthSay NoBoundaries QuotesBoundaries Of LifeBoundaries Of Your World
Book:Holistic Wealth Personal Workbook: 32 Life Lessons to Help You Find Purpose, Prosperity, and Happiness
Create image