Dewitt Quotes & Sayings

My instinct is to write under the cloak of an opaque historical setting. — Patrick DeWitt

For me, there are a lot of things you can imagine as an actor, and then there are things that you know in your bones and in your cells once they happen to you. — Rosemarie DeWitt

I'm never doing anything by rote. I'm only on thin ice, and I think that that's a good place to be. I feel like when you push yourself like that, the rewards can be pretty great. — Patrick DeWitt

I don't want to put a pause on the rest of my life; I'm really enjoying getting older and the wisdom that comes from that. — Rosemarie DeWitt

I've always felt so fortunate to have writing to turn to every day. I'm obsessed with it. — Patrick DeWitt

I do believe in the value of ideas - and that eventually they get a man somewhere. — DeWitt Wallace

Mother--that was the bank where we deposited all our hurts and worries. — T. DeWitt Talmage

Growing up I was a total movie-holic, but I always wanted to play the role that Clark Gable was playing or Spencer Tracy was playing. I was really never interested in the parts that women were playing. I found the parts that guys were playing were so much more interesting. — Joyce DeWitt

You always bring God into arguments you know you're losing, for the liar is lonely, and welcomes all manner of company. — Patrick DeWitt

Walking away on the springy legs of a foal he thought, How remarkable a thing a lie is. He wondered if it wasn't man's finest achievement, and after some consideration, he decided it was. — Patrick DeWitt

The hardest thing in the world for a writer is to amass a readership. So many good books come out, and so many good books disappear. — Patrick DeWitt

This moment, this one position in time, was the happiest I will ever be as long as I am living. I have since felt it was too happy, that men are not meant to have access to this kind of satisfaction; certainly it has tempered every moment of happiness I have experienced since. — Patrick DeWitt

I could leave here and return to my hometown, but I would not return as the person I was when I left,' he explained. 'I would not recognize anyone. And no one would recognize me. — Patrick DeWitt

Shirley Maclaine once said that she didn't want to be a big star, just a long star. That's what I want too. — Joyce DeWitt

This marked the end of our toothbrush conversation. — Patrick DeWitt

The question of likability is a bit of a puzzler for me. You know, I don't write people with likability in mind. It's more whether or not I find them compelling. — Patrick DeWitt

Don't be the best in the world. Be the best for the world. — Dewitt Jones

Often the starting point for characters, for me, is finding a little, most minor detail, and I'll go from there. — Patrick DeWitt

There are ten in a circle and everyone wants to speak and no one cares what the other person presently speaking is talking about. Someone starts crying about having been molested as a child; someone starts crying about a dead mother; someone wants to go to Las Vegas. You slip out the side door and into your car. It is five-thirty in the morning and the sky is the color of a three-day-old bruise. It is beautiful. — Patrick DeWitt

If you were at school they would not let you read a book like this, they would keep you from reading it by involving you in sport. — Helen DeWitt

He liked I expect the idea of effortless excellence, and being unable to combine the two has settled for the one he could be sure of ... — Helen DeWitt

The typical review makes a Teletubby look like a sabre-toothed tiger. You can economize by reading online rather than squandering $4.95, yes, but all you get is people pusillanimously Favoriting and Liking and Friending. Why is there no Hate button? Why? — Helen DeWitt

So Lucille pressed the button, and a panel slid open in the wall, and the transporter came through, and sure enough here was the bare butt of the client waiting to be whipped. For reasons best known to himself he had kept his shoes and socks on, so he was wearing well-polished black loafers and black silk socks. — Helen DeWitt

Start out by celebrating the best in the situation because it allows us to fall in love with it, which connects us to our passion and emancipates the energy. — Dewitt Jones

I can do what I love or I can love what I do. Learn to love the task in front of you. — Dewitt Jones

The theme of luck comes up a lot. It's something I thought about before, why some people are lucky and some people aren't lucky. It seems like some people you meet can sort of cultivate luck, and I've always been fascinated by that. — Patrick DeWitt

We rode along in silence, thinking our private thoughts. Charlie and I had an unspoken agreement not to throw ourselves into speedy travel just after a meal. There were many hardships to our type of life and we took these small comforts as they came; I found they added up to something decent enough to carry on — Patrick DeWitt

I once read somewhere that Sean Connery left school at the age of 13 and later went on to read Proust and Finnegans Wake and I keep expecting to meet an enthusiastic school leaver on the train, the type of person who only ever reads something because it is marvellous (and so hated school). Unfortunately the enthusiastic school leavers are all minding their own business. — Helen DeWitt

One of the nice things about writing is you can take essentially painful things in your life and turn them into something that might be useful, or at least entertaining, to somebody else. — Patrick DeWitt

and that Eli, is how you got your freckles — Patrick DeWitt

I will never be a leader of men, and neither do I want to be one, and neither do I want to be led. I thought: I want to lead only myself. — Patrick DeWitt

He wandered here and there over rolling hills.
He never saw the ocean but
dreamed of it often enough. — Patrick DeWitt

I quite agree with you. The sun is not kind. God should use a rose amber spot. — Dewitt Bodeen

Every once in a while in an actor's life, a cast comes together. — Joyce DeWitt

I got home and I thought I should stop leading so aimless an existence. It is harder than you might think to stop leading an existence, & if you can't do that the only thing you can do is try to introduce an element of purposefulness ... and though I might have to wait another 30 or 40 years for my body to join the non-sentient things in the world at least in the meantime it would be a less absolutely senseless sentience. OK. — Helen DeWitt

Returning his pen to its holder, he told us, 'I will have him gutted with that scythe. I will hang him by his own intestines.' At this piece of dramatic exposition, I could not hep but roll my eyes. A length of intestines would not carry the weight of a child, much less a full grown man. — Patrick DeWitt

Butch, you come from DeWitt Clinton. There are five thousand brothers in that school. You're the best there. You've been all-city two years in a row. How bad can you be? You come with me and we'll make nice music. — Al McGuire

A lot of my favourite books - I should say, not much happens in the books! It's much more about the points of view of the author more than anything else. — Patrick DeWitt

He only tells the story once but you see it from about 8 points of view, you have to pay attention the whole time to see whether something seems to be true or is just what somebody says is true. — Helen DeWitt

Your laughter is like cool water to me," I said. I felt my heart sob at these strange words, and it would not have been hard to summon tears: Strange. " "You are so serious all of a sudden," she told me. "I am not any one thing," I said. (137) — Patrick DeWitt

See the world with new eyes every day. — Dewitt Jones

Especially if you're endeavouring daily to write your own books, you read with a degree of - well, it's hard to forget you're a writer when you're reading. — Patrick DeWitt

The temperate man is the strong man. — William DeWitt Hyde

If that's the way the game is played, I don't want to play anymore. — Joyce DeWitt

Some wear greed as a fine suit of clothes. But you, my son, bear its stamp ever more poorly. — Patrick DeWitt

Animals are ever so psychic. There are some people who just can't come in here. The cats particularly seem to know. You can fool everybody, but landy M deary-me, you can't fool a cat. They seem to know who's not right, if you know what I mean. — Dewitt Bodeen

The reason is that even in a fantasy there is nothing even remotely erotic about a toilet bowl. In fact, considered as an accoutrement to a sexual encounter, a toilet bowl is a real cold shower. — Helen DeWitt

General manager Frank Lane made his mark on the club by making several unpopular or unsuccessful trades. Among the guys he traded to other teams are Rocky Colavito, Roger Maris, Norm Cash, and ... manager Joe Gordon? Uh, yes. Lane and Detroit GM Bill DeWitt traded managers - Joe Gordon for Jimmy Dykes. Lane's tenure ended shortly thereafter, long before the damage he caused. — Tucker Elliot

The story of Reginald Watts was a luckless one dealing in every manner of failure and catastrophe, though he spoke of this without bitterness or regret, and in fact seemed to find humor in his numberless missteps: 'I've failed at straight business, I've failed at criminal enterprise, I've failed at love, I've failed at friendship. You name it, I've failed at it. Go ahead and name something. Anything at all. — Patrick DeWitt

At the age of seventeen, I decided I would spend my life writing fiction. I didn't know what this entailed, exactly - a room, I supposed. A room and books and paper and solitude. — Patrick DeWitt

I've fallen in love in my life a few times. It's the most exciting part of being alive - that I've experienced, anyway. — Patrick DeWitt

When your protagonist bores you, you're in trouble. — Patrick DeWitt

I thought, When a man is properly drunk it is as though he is an a room by himself
there is a physical, impenetrable separation between him and his fellows. — Patrick DeWitt

I grew up in the suburbs. — Rosemarie DeWitt

When you sleep, your dreams are those of a dullard — Patrick DeWitt

One night, after hours, you are alone and running your hands under the hot water when the voice asks if you aren't through with your ablutions yet. You do not know the word but write it down to look it up the next day. You learn its definition on page 3 of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary: "The washing of one's body or part of it (as in a religious rite)." You are certain you have never heard this word before as you were raised without any religion and have never set foot inside any church or temple, and you return the dictionary to the shelf and vow never to play this game of counting your wounds again. — Patrick DeWitt

Despite Tub's eye wound he never so much as stumbled, and I felt for the first time that we knew and understood each other; I sensed in him a desire to improve himself, which perhaps was whimsy or wishful thinking on my part, but such are the musings of the traveling man. The — Patrick DeWitt

Beware of the plygs of Colorado City, Arizona. They have no cups of coffee for the likes of you. — Patrick DeWitt

Inside beauty sometimes needs a little help from outside pretty. — Karen DeWitt

It is a glory and a torment. — Patrick DeWitt

After school, I got a job in a shop in Hollywood and shared an apartment with a friend. I promptly lost my job and got evicted from my apartment, and that happened several times. — Patrick DeWitt

It would seem to me that the solitude of working in the wilds is not healthy for a man. — Patrick DeWitt

When you meet someone you love, whether or not they love you back, something occurs in you that makes you want to improve yourself. — Patrick DeWitt

All of my close friends are emotional train wrecks. This is what makes our lives interesting - constantly doubting ourselves, worrying, wondering if we've made a mistake. Could we have done better? Are we good people? Are we bad people? — Patrick DeWitt

There is a strange taboo in our society against ending something merely because it is not pleasant
life, love, a conversation, you name it, the etiquette is that you must begin in ignorance & persevere in the face of knowledge, & though I naturally believe that this is profoundly wrong it's not nice to go around constantly offending people. — Helen DeWitt

My mother practiced hours every day, hours as painful to hear as to play. At first everybody thought she would give in. Day followed day, and the terrible stumbling sounds went on for hours on end.
She did not know what else to do. — Helen DeWitt

Mayfield said, You asked what I was thinking. Well, I will tell you. I was thinking that a man like myself, after suffering such a blow as you men have struck on this day, has two distinct paths he might travel in his life. He might walk out into the world with a wounded heart, intent on sharing his mad hatred with every person he passes; or, he might start out anew with an empty heart, and he should take care to fill it up with only proud things from then on, so as to nourish his desolate mind-set and cultivate something positive or new. — Patrick DeWitt

I think of myself as somebody who, in a moment-to-moment way, I'm quite happy. But I think I am a bit doubtful and wary of true happiness, and, like a lot of my friends, there's been a good degree of self-sabotage. — Patrick DeWitt

I have a paranoia that 'Ablutions' is the best thing I'll ever do. — Patrick DeWitt

I reckon I probably worked for Euripides a long time ago. I do think we have many Earth walks and it's possible that he's an old friend. Does that sound too stupid for words? Quite frankly I think I've been an actor in so many lifetimes. — Joyce DeWitt

Yamamoto said he thought you had to be able to hear how something did not work as part of a bigger thing to hear how it did and it was precisely because people couldn't hear that that they were willing to let movements be taken out of pieces. — Helen DeWitt

Certain writers look down their noses at plot, and I think I might have been one of them until I tried it. — Patrick DeWitt

I don't know that I'd call myself an optimist. — Patrick DeWitt

If you're a salesman, you have to deal with yourself the way you are. Not how you'd like to be.
If you don't have what it takes, you can waste a lot of time asking yourself "How can I get what it takes?" The question you should be asking yourself is, "Is there something else that takes what I have to offer?" Because if there's something you can succeed at, just the way you are, you won't have to waste a lot of time trying to change yourself. Which you're never going to be able to do, anyway. — Helen DeWitt

I am increasingly unimpressed by works of art that require a college degree to understand. I think that art should be for everyone. And people should be moved by it. — Patrick DeWitt

Make the subtle shift from pushing ourselves to be the best in the world, to allowing ourselves to be the best for the world. — Dewitt Jones

Without sin, what grace has forgiveness — Anonymous

I wish you wouldn't say the first thing that comes into your head, Ludo. There is an obvious difference between someone who works within the technical limitations of his time which are beyond his control and someone who accepts without thinking limitations which are entirely within his own power to set aside. — Helen DeWitt

I feel lucky to be an actor because you always learn something from each part you play. — Rosemarie DeWitt

The writer who is literally an addict, the writer who can't help himself, the writer who HAS to write, can never be anything but an amateur, because the industry requires the professional to put writing on hold not just for a day or two, or a week, but for years. — Helen DeWitt

The Internet, of course, is more than a place to find pictures of people having sex with dogs. — Philip Elmer-DeWitt

We can all of us be hurt, and no one is exclusively safe from worry and sadness. — Patrick DeWitt

A lot of authors, judging by their list, will put anything out that they finish ... That's the worst model I've heard of in my life. It's just idiotic. Why wouldn't you just wait for the good ones? — Patrick DeWitt

There is nothing typical about my profession.' Suddenly I did not want to talk about it any longer. 'I don't want to talk about it any longer. — Patrick DeWitt

Just your everyday grouping of civilized gentlemen, sitting in a round robin to discuss the events of the day with quivering erections. — Patrick DeWitt

Looking around, I saw so many unhappy adults, people who loathed their jobs, and I didn't want to be one of them. — Patrick DeWitt

Your skin is prickly from fatigue and pain and there is a hissing in your ears. Time passes and the pills are taking hold like a glowing white planet coming into view. A reverse eclipse. And you watch with your eyes closed. The white planet is half exposed, it grips your heart in its light and seems to be pulling you forward and now you feel that you are falling. You are awake but dreaming. "The earth is not beautiful but the universe is," you say. — Patrick DeWitt

I felt like love has been underrepresented - unironic love, just actually really falling in love. — Patrick DeWitt

I really felt that 'Three's Company' was a gift. When it ended, I had money in the bank and had the luxury to pursue a life that meant something, to learn and discover. — Joyce DeWitt

I was reading my son some fables; it made for good nighttime reading. These stories were very vivid and very strange and occasionally bizarrely violent. It was a very free landscape. — Patrick DeWitt

I kept trying to write these books that were sort of outside of my realm, and I kept failing. — Patrick DeWitt

I carry a small spiral notebook with me at all times and have been doing this for many years. There's a shoe box in my closet filled with these notebooks, each riddled with notes and impressions, ideas, schemes, and soup recipes. — Patrick DeWitt

Feeling my middle section, which is and always has been bountiful, I said I did not think I would fit in the small — Patrick DeWitt

Here lies Morris, a good man and friend. He enjoyed the finer points of civilized life but never shied away from a hearty adventure or hard work. He died a free man, which is more than most people can say, if we are going to be honest about it. Most people are chained to their own fear and stupidity and haven't the sense to level a cold eye at just what is wrong with their lives. Most people will continue on, dissatisfied but never attempting to understand why, or how they might change things for the better, and they die with nothing in their hearts but dirt and old, thin blood - weak blood, diluted - and their memories aren't worth a goddamned thing, you will see what I mean. — Patrick DeWitt

Humorous writing is often thought of as substandard in comparison to work with a more dramatic or tragic intent. I don't know what to say to this except that I disagree wholeheartedly. — Patrick DeWitt

I had no plan to write a western novel, and when I realized it was happening, I was pretty surprised by it. But you have to go with what feels right. — Patrick DeWitt

As a reader I want to be present and entertained. I don't want to be taught lessons, and I don't want to be spoken down to. I want to be treated as a peer and to be made to feel welcome. — Patrick DeWitt

My first book didn't even have a Canadian publisher. And that upset me, because I so wanted a readership up there. — Patrick DeWitt

Creativity is the ability to look at the ordinary and see the extraordinary. — Dewitt Jones

Nature shows me incredible beauty standing just beyond the rat race. It's always there if I'm open enough to see it. — Dewitt Jones