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I think that maybe if women and children were in charge we would get somewhere.

James Thurber

Comedy has ceased to be a challenge to the mental processes. It has become a therapy of relaxation, a kind of tranquilizing drug.
JAMES THURBER

Challenge Comedy Drugs Therapy
Discussion in America means dissent.
JAMES THURBER

Country Discussion
Comedy has to be done en clair. You can’t blunt the edge of wit or the point of satire with obscurity. Try to imagine a famous witty saying that is not immediately clear.
JAMES THURBER

Clear Comedy Famous Imagination Point
The unicorn is a mythical beast.
JAMES THURBER

Fantasy Myth Unicorn
But what is all this fear of and opposition to Oblivion? What is the matter with the soft Darkness, the Dreamless Sleep?
JAMES THURBER

Darkness Dreams Fear Sleep
I can feel a thing I cannot touch and touch a thing I cannot feel. The first is sad and sorry, the second is your heart.
JAMES THURBER

Feeling Heart Sadness Sorry Touch Yourself
I am not a cat man, but a dog man, and all felines can tell this at a glance – a sharp, vindictive glance.
JAMES THURBER

Man Myself Sharp
History is replete with proofs, from Cato the Elder to Kennedy the Younger, that if you scratch a statesman you find an actor, but it is becoming harder and harder, in our time, to tell government from show business.
JAMES THURBER

Business Evidence Government History Ourselves Time
Humourists lead… an existence of jumpiness and apprehension. They sit on the edge of the chair of Literature. In the house of Life they have the feeling that they have never taken off their overcoats.
JAMES THURBER

Edge Existence Literature
Progress was all right. Only it went on too long.
JAMES THURBER

Progress Right Time
Time is for dragonflies and angels. The former live too little and the latter live too long.
JAMES THURBER

Angel Lifespan Time
The laughter of man is more terrible than his tears, and takes more forms -hollow, heartless, mirthless, maniacal.
JAMES THURBER

Heartless Laughter Man Tears Terrible
Americans want to go to heaven without dying.
JAMES THURBER

Death Deep Heaven Hypocrisy Sarcasm
A false or misunderstood word may create as much disaster as a sudden thoughtless act.
JAMES THURBER

Act Creation Fake Misunderstanding Thinking
I never quite know when I’m not writing. Sometimes my wife comes up to me at a party and says, “Dammit, Thurber, stop writing.” She usually catches me in the middle of a paragraph.
JAMES THURBER

Catch Herself Known Myself Poet Quite Writing
I was seized by the stern hand of Compulsion, that dark, unreasonable Urge that impels women to clean house in the middle of the night.
JAMES THURBER

Cleaning Hands Night Reason

I think that maybe if women and children were in charge we would get somewhere.

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I think that maybe if women and children were in charge we would get somewhere.

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