Garrison Keillor Quotes & Sayings

There is almost no marital problem that can't be helped enormously by taking off your clothes. — Garrison Keillor

Your life is a work of art, and in the end, the underlying theme of great art is bravery and hope and love. — Garrison Keillor

Where I come from, when a Catholic marries a Lutheran it is considered the first step on the road to Minneapolis. — Garrison Keillor

When writing loses touch with the beautiful surface of the world, it loses its way. You always want to be in touch with how things look and what people say and what they call their dogs. — Garrison Keillor

Sex is not a mechanical act that fails for lack of technique, and it is not a performance by the male for the audience of the female; it is a continuum of attraction that extends from the simplest conversation and the most innocent touching through the act of coitus. — Garrison Keillor

Life is unjust and this is what makes it so beautiful. Every day is a gift. Be brave and take hold of it. — Garrison Keillor

It?s a beautiful descent in a 737, into the Bitterroot Valley, following the Clark Fork River, on a perfect golden autumn day . — Garrison Keillor

An interesting thing about New York City is that the subways run through the sewers. — Garrison Keillor

This is Democratic bedrock: we don't let people lie in the ditch and drive past and pretend not to see them dying. Here on the frozen tundra of Minnesota, if your neighbor's car won't start, you put on your parka and get the jumper cables out and deliver the Sacred Spark that starts their car. Everybody knows this. The logical extension of this spirit is social welfare and the myriad government programs with long dry names all very uninteresting to you until you suddenly need one ... — Garrison Keillor

How many therapists does it take to change a lightbulb? How many therapists do you think it takes to change a lightbulb? — Garrison Keillor

Bad things don't happen to writers; it's all material. — Garrison Keillor

I want to resume the life of a shy person. — Garrison Keillor

People always are encouraging about a terrible loss, so that sometimes the loser would like to strangle them. — Garrison Keillor

A married guy is responsible for everything, no matter what. Women, thanks to their having been oppressed all these years, are blameless, free as birds, and all the dirt they do is the result of premenstrual syndrome or postmenstrual stress or menopause or emotional disempowerment by their fathers or low expectations by their teachers or latent unspoken sexual harassment in the workplace, or some other airy excuse. The guy alone is responsible for every day of marriage that is less than marvelous and meaningful. — Garrison Keillor

Secret of life is to go through something harrowing that doesnt kill you ... and to love one woman for the rest of your life. — Garrison Keillor

If the marriage needs help, the answer almost always is have more fun. Drop your list of grievances and go ride a roller coaster. — Garrison Keillor

Writing is the main gig and teaching and performing are sidelines, an excuse for not writing more. Working on a novel and on an opera make me seriously want to retire and find a volunteer job as a docent at the zoo explaining to schoolchildren where frogs go in the winter. — Garrison Keillor

My ability to keep cool in a crisis is based entirely on not knowing all the facts. — Garrison Keillor

Some people think it is difficult to be a Christian and to laugh, but I think it's the other way around. God writes a lot of comedy, its just that he has so many bad actors. — Garrison Keillor

Being an English major prepares you for impersonating authority. — Garrison Keillor

Anyone who thinks sitting in church can make you a Christian must also think that sitting in a garage can make you a car. — Garrison Keillor

Most men are prisoners at best, Who some strong habit every drag about Like chain and ball. — Garrison Keillor

The great unrequited love tears open your heart to the beauty of the world, its small rivers and upland meadows. It also makes you kinder to the next hundred thousand persons who cross your path. — Garrison Keillor

You've got work to do. Don't put this off. And don't take the long view, here. You know? Life is today and tomorrow and- and if you're lucky, next week. — Garrison Keillor

Three people were going to the guillotine. The first was a lawyer, who was led to the platform, blindfolded, and had his head put on the block. The executioner pulled the lanyard, but nothing happened. To avoid a messy lawsuit, the authorities allowed the lawyer to go free. The next man to the guillotine was a priest. They put his head on the block and pulled the lanyard, but nothing happened. The blade didn't come down. They thought it must have been divine intervention, so they let the priest go. The third man to the guillotine was an engineer. He waived his right to a blindfold, so they led him to the guillotine and put his head on the block. As he lay there, he said, Hey, wait. I think I see your problem. — Garrison Keillor

For me, the monologue was the favorite thing I had done in radio. It was based on writing, but in the end it was radio, it was standing up and leaning forward into the dark and talking, letting words come out of you. — Garrison Keillor

Book is a gift that you can open again and again. — Garrison Keillor

A man can't eat anger for breakfast and sleep with it at night and not suffer damage to his soul. — Garrison Keillor

A lovely thing about Christmas is that it's compulsory, like a thunderstorm, and we all go through it together. — Garrison Keillor

You're such a big liar you gotta get your neighbor to call your dog. — Garrison Keillor

People do what they are told not to do. It happens time and time again. Here on the frozen tundra, it is known as the Tongue on the Frozen Pump Handle principle. — Garrison Keillor

I've seen the truth, and it makes no sense. — Garrison Keillor

All solutions are temporary, so why not go for duct tape? — Garrison Keillor

I hear a little firecracker go off when you come up with a good rhyme. — Garrison Keillor

There's so many people who move around our country and lose track of their own ancestry. It's nice to know where you come from. — Garrison Keillor

I'm of an age when if I started to do eulogies, I'd be doing nothing else. You don't want to be remembered? I don't want them to be told to remember me. — Garrison Keillor

I can see how I could write a bold account of myself as a passionate man who rose from humble beginnings to cut a wide swath in the world, whose crimes along the way might be written off to extravagance and love and art, and could even almost believe some of it myself on certain days after the sun went down if I'd had a snort or two and was in Los Angeles and it was February and I was twenty-four, but I find a truer account in the Herald-Star, where it says: "Mr. Gary Keillor visited at the home of Al and Florence Crandall on Monday and after lunch returned to St. Paul, where he is currently employed in the radio show business ... Lunch was fried chicken with gravy and creamed peas". — Garrison Keillor

I'm not busy ... a woman with three children under the age of 10 wouldn't think my schedule looked so busy. — Garrison Keillor

You young people learned spelling by the 'Close Enough' method. — Garrison Keillor

A compassionate conservative is someone who electrocutes juveniles but lets them have a last 'make a wish'. — Garrison Keillor

My own life would make a pretty dull story, I think, and I envy him as I drive to work on a cold Minnesota morning across the Mississippi River with its coal barges still struggling upstream like so many of us nowadays. — Garrison Keillor

I loved feeling special. I hated feeling special. — Garrison Keillor

I don't have a great eye for detail. I leave blanks in all of my stories. I leave out all detail, which leaves the reader to fill in something better. — Garrison Keillor

When you're old you feast on your memories, and if you spend too much time on exercise, you may get old and not have many. — Garrison Keillor

Computers can never completely replace humans. They may become capable of artificial intelligence, but they will never master real stupidity. — Garrison Keillor

Humor needs to come in under cover of darkness, in disguise, and surprise people. — Garrison Keillor

The funniest line in English is 'Get it?' When you say that, everyone chortles. — Garrison Keillor

That's the news from Lake Woebegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average. — Garrison Keillor

As a former English major, I am a sitting duck for Gift Books, and in the past few years I've gotten Dickens, Thackeray, Smollet, Richardson, Emerson, Keats, Boswell and the Brontes, all of them Great, none of them ever read by me, all of them now on a shelf, looking at me and making me feel guilty. — Garrison Keillor

TV news is as bloody as Shakespeare but without the intelligence and the poetry. If you watch television news you know less about the world than if you drank gin out of a bottle — Garrison Keillor

Sometimes you have to look reality in the eye, and deny it. — Garrison Keillor

Intelligence is like four-wheel drive. It only allows you to get stuck in more remote places. — Garrison Keillor

Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a purpose. — Garrison Keillor

Humor is not a trick, not jokes. Humor is a presence in the world - like grace - and shines on everybody. — Garrison Keillor

In California virtually everyone has had their teeth whitened. If they all smiled at once, they would give us a headache. — Garrison Keillor

Not everyone has a Life's Work. Some people simply have a Life. — Garrison Keillor

How many pessimists does it take to change a lightbulb? Never mind. Nobody would get the joke anyway. — Garrison Keillor

Freedom doesn't mean aimlessness. We can't just sleepwalk through life ... Freedom demands structure. — Garrison Keillor

The teacher was asking her students what their parents did for a living, and Timmy stood up and said, "My daddy's a doctor and my mommy's a doctor too." And little Sarah stood up and said, "My mommy's an engineer and my daddy's an accountant." And then little Billy stands up and says, "My mommy's a writer and my daddy plays the piano in a whorehouse." The teacher was horrified and later she called Billy's father, and said, "Why would you ever tell your child a thing like that?" And the father said, "Well, actually I'm a defense lawyer. But how do you explain a thing like that to a seven-year-old? — Garrison Keillor

We thank you [the soldiers recently returned from the middle east] for your service. — Garrison Keillor

Librarians, Dusty, possess a vast store of politeness. These are people who get asked regularly the dumbest questions on God's green earth. These people tolerate every kind of crank and eccentric and mouth breather there is. — Garrison Keillor

I never was one to get upset about a few scratches on a motor vehicle, it is meant to be used, not saved. — Garrison Keillor

In Lake Wobegon, we don't forget mistakes. — Garrison Keillor

We come from people who brought us up to believe that life is a struggle, and if you should feel really happy, be patient: this will pass. — Garrison Keillor

I've wanted to be a writer since I was a boy, though it seemed an unlikely outcome since I showed no real talent. But I persevered and eventually found my own row to hoe. Ignorance of other writers' work keeps me from discouragement and I am less well-read than the average bus driver. — Garrison Keillor

It was luxuries like air conditioning that brought down the Roman Empire. With air conditioning their windows were shut, they couldn't hear the barbarians coming. — Garrison Keillor

He was admired for never being at a loss for words and never wasting any either. — Garrison Keillor

Boys, the first drink is a boon, the second is a gamble, the third is poor judgment, and then the rate of descent gets steep — Garrison Keillor

Vodka is tasteless going down, but it is memorable coming up. — Garrison Keillor

You don't want to get that sort of sound in your writing that boing that gives you away. — Garrison Keillor

Growing up in a place that has winter, you learn to avoid self-pity. Winter is not a personal experience, everybody else is just as cold as you, so you shouldn't complain about it too much. You learn this as a kid, coming home crying from the cold, and Mother looks down and says, 'It's only a little frostbite. You're okay.' And thus you learn to be okay. What's done is done. Get over it. Drink your coffee. It's not the best you'll ever get but it's good enough. — Garrison Keillor

Selective ignorance, a cornerstone of child rearing. You don't put kids under surveillance: it might frighten you. Parents should sit tall in the saddle and look upon their troops with a noble and benevolent and extremely nearsighted gaze. — Garrison Keillor

March is the month God created to show people who don't drink what a hangover is like. — Garrison Keillor

Years ago, manhood was an opportunity for achievement, now it is a problem to be overcome. — Garrison Keillor

We English majors ... need to promote public libraries as a tool in the war against terror. How many readers of Edith Wharton have engaged in terroristic acts? I challenge you to name one ... Do we need to wait until our cities lie in smoking ruins before we wake up to the fact that a first-class public library is a vital link in national defense? — Garrison Keillor

God writes a lot of comedy ... the trouble is, he's stuck with so many bad actors who don't know how to play funny. — Garrison Keillor

If you can't read a simple goddam sign and follow one simple goddam instruction then get your fat butt the hell out of here. — Garrison Keillor

By God, no matter what Republicans say, the people of this country really do care about each other. We are not a cold people. By God, when John F. Kennedy said, "Ask what you can do for your country," he spoke to this country's heart and conscience. — Garrison Keillor

Too many of my fellow Christians voted for selfishness and for degradation of the beautiful world God created. I guess they figured that by the time the planet was a smoky wasteland, they'd be nice and comfy in heaven, so wotthehell. — Garrison Keillor

She gave him such a look ... Man oh man, if looks could kill. That one might have totalled a city block. — Garrison Keillor

Sometimes you have to avoid mentioning things because people's feelings are tender. — Garrison Keillor

A boy wrote me once to say that he loved it when the news from Lake Wobegon came on the radio because it meant that his parents stopped arguing. That was an eye-opener for me. You work hard to polish your act and then you find out that it does people good in ways you couldn't predict. — Garrison Keillor

Eople (in Minnesota) avoid stupidity when possible, not wanting to be a $10 haircut on a 50 cent head. — Garrison Keillor

If you can't trust a Methodist with absolute power to arrest people and not have to say why, then whom can you trust? — Garrison Keillor

When you're a little kid, your heart is open and tender and a harsh word can go straight in and become part of your life. — Garrison Keillor

Minnesota is a state of public-spirited and polite people, where you can get a good cappucino and eat Thai food and find any book you want and yet live on a quiet tree-lined street with a backyard and send your kids to public school. When a state this good hits the jackpot, it can only be an inspiration to everybody. — Garrison Keillor

Ha! Easy for nuns to talk about giving up things. That's what they do for a living. — Garrison Keillor

The reason to retire is to try to avoid embarrassment; you ought to do it before people are dropping big hints. You want to be the first to come up with the idea. You don't want to wait until you trip and fall off the stage. — Garrison Keillor

I used to think that kid might become a preacher. Now I don't see how he's going to stay out of prison. Nobody in this family ever went to prison for sex crimes. He'd be the first."
Yes," says Jesus, "you never know about these things."
He and Grandpa are drinking cups of coffee and eating ginger snaps. Grandpa says, "When are you planning to return to earth?"
Soon as I finish this coffee," say Jesus. "Pretty good, isn't it. — Garrison Keillor

People meet writers and are bowled over when the writer is friendly to them and invites them to his house for a glass of wine or to shoot up heroin or whatever they do, and they talk their heads off, and a year later it comes out in a book, and there follow years of bitter and fruitless litigation, and that is why you should always keep a writer at arm's length. — Garrison Keillor

A girl in a bikini is like having a loaded gun on your coffee table- There's nothing wrong with them, but it's hard to stop thinking about. — Garrison Keillor

One reads books in order to gain the privilege of living more than one life. People who don't read are trapped in a mine shaft, even if they think the sun is shining. — Garrison Keillor

Know the quiet place within your heart and touch the rainbow of possibility; be alive to the gentle breeze of communication, and please stop being such a jerk. — Garrison Keillor

Roy Blount's stuff makes me laugh so hard, sometimes I have to go sit in a room and shut the door — Garrison Keillor

Girls ... were allowed to play in the house ... and boys were sent outdoors ... Boys ran around in the yard with toy guns going kksshh-kksshh, fighting wars for made-up reasons and arguing about who was dead, while girls stayed inside and played with dolls, creating complex family groups and learning how to solve problems through negotiation and roleplaying. Which gender is better equipped, on the whole, to live an adult life, would you guess? — Garrison Keillor

As for kissing on the first date, you should never date someone whom you would not wish to kiss immediately. — Garrison Keillor

Marrying for sex is like flying to London for the free peanuts and pretzels. It's not the point of the thing, is it? — Garrison Keillor

When you wage war on the public schools, you're attacking the mortar that holds the community together. You're not a conservative, you're a vandal. — Garrison Keillor

I think that if writers are tempted to do other things, they ought to go do other things. They should not write if they don't feel like it. I say this as a competitor. I am not interested in encouraging people who are in competition with me. — Garrison Keillor

On investments, 1998: Where I'm from we don't trust paper. Wealth is what's here on the premises. If I open a cupboard and see, say, 30 cans of tomato sauce and a five-pound bag of rice, I get a little thrill of well-being - much more so than if I take a look at the quarterly dividend report from my mutual fund. — Garrison Keillor