Van Wyck Quotes & Sayings

A man who has the courage of his platitudes is always a successful man. The instructed man is ashamed to pronounce in an orphic manner what everybody knows, and because he is silent people think he is making fun of them. They like a man who expresses their own superficial thoughts in a manner that appears to be profound. This enables them to feel that they are themselves profound. — Van Wyck Brooks

The writer is important only by dint of the territory he colonizes. — Van Wyck Brooks

No one in this country has any root anywhere; we don't live in America, we board here, we are like spiders that run over the surface of the water. — Van Wyck Brooks

The letters a and l are the most common in Arabic, partly because of the definite article al-, whereas the letter j appears only a tenth as frequently. — Simon Singh

Nothing is sadder than having worldly standards without worldly means. — Van Wyck Brooks

And God created every living creature
that now moveth, and one was man. Mud as man alone could speak.
God leaned close as mud as man sat up, looked around, and spoke.
Man blinked. "What is the purpose of all this?" he asked politely.
"Everything must have a purpose?" asked God.
"Certainly," said man.
"Then I leave it to you to think of one for all this," said God. And He
went away. — Kurt Vonnegut

Nothing is so soothing to our self-esteem as to find our bad traits in our forebears. It seems to absolve us. — Van Wyck Brooks

Better the fragrant herb of wit and a little cream of affability than all the pretty cups in the world. — Van Wyck Brooks

How delightful is the company of generous people, who overlook trifles and keep their minds instinctively fixed on whatever is good and positive in the world around them. — Van Wyck Brooks

The United States exists as a sovereign nation. 'America,' in contrast, exists as a myth of democracy and equal opportunity to live by, or as an ideal goal to reach. — Bharati Mukherjee

I've been voted one of Australia's 50 national treasures. I've even had my face on an Australian stamp - the only non-Australian to do so, apart from the Queen, of course. — Russell Crowe

The smallest thought could not exist unless the entire universe and the laws of physics were in some way encouraging it. — Kevin Kelly

People of small caliber are always carping. They are bent on showing their own superiority, their knowledge or prowess or good breeding. — Van Wyck Brooks

If men were basically evil, who would bother to improve the world instead of giving it up as a bad job at the outset? — Van Wyck Brooks

Earnest people are often people who habitually look on the serious side of things that have no serious side. — Van Wyck Brooks

The city has a face, the country a soul. — Jacques De Lacretelle

It is not that the French are not profound, but they all express themselves so well that we are led to take their geese for swans. — Van Wyck Brooks

The American mind, unlike the English, is not formed by books, but, as Carl Sandburg once said to me ... by newspapers and the Bible. — Van Wyck Brooks

There is no stopping the world's tendency to throw off imposed restraints, the religious authority that is based on the ignorance of the many, the political authority that is based on the knowledge of the few. — Van Wyck Brooks

The creative impulses of man are always at war with the possessive impulses. — Van Wyck Brooks

Never forget that it is we New Yorkers and New Englanders who have the monopoly of whatever oxygen there is in the American continent. — Van Wyck Brooks

The instructed man is ashamed to pronounce in an Orphic manner what everybody knows, and because he is silent people think he is making fun of them. — Van Wyck Brooks

Kittens can happen to anyone. — Paul Gallico

Genius and virtue are to be more often found clothed in gray than in peacock bright. — Van Wyck Brooks

No one is fit to judge a book until he has rounded Cape Horn in a sailing vessel, until he has bumped into two or three icebergs, until he has been lost in the sands of the desert, until he has spent a few years in the House of the Dead. — Van Wyck Brooks

As against having beautiful workshops, studies, etc., one writes best in a cellar on a rainy day. — Van Wyck Brooks

Magnanimous people have no vanity, they have no jealousy, and they feed on the true and the solid wherever they find it. And, what is more, they find it everywhere. — Van Wyck Brooks

Once you have a point of view all history will back you up. — Van Wyck Brooks

The man who has the courage of his platitudes is always a successful man. — Van Wyck Brooks

Mother shook her head impatiently. 'You need to ... stop looking for heroes, Anne.' Her speech was slow, slurred, but understandable. 'Only the weak need ... heroes ... and heroes need ... those around them to remain weak. You're ... not weak.' I remembered those words. I knew they were true, all of them. True about me, and true about Charles. I brought them out, every now and then, as I kept working
on both the manuscript and myself. And, perhaps on my definition of my marriage. No, my prayer for my marriage; a marriage of two equals. With separate
but equally valid
views of the world; shared goggles no more, but looking at the same scenery, at the same time. — Melanie Benjamin

Longfellow is to poetry what the barrel-organ is to music. — Van Wyck Brooks

Those of our writers who have possessed a vivid personal talent have been paralyzed by a want of social background. — Van Wyck Brooks

No man should ever publish a book until he has first read it to a woman. — Van Wyck Brooks