If a man is to be obsessed by something, I suppose a boat is as good as anything, perhaps a bit better than most.
E. B. WHITEGood deeds never go unpunished.
More E. B. White Quotes
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You’re terrific as far as I am concerned.
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“What’s miraculous about a spider’s web?” said Mrs. Arable. “I don’t see why you say a web is a miracle–it’s just a web.” “Ever try to spin one?” asked Mr. Dorian.
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Extreme cold when it first arrives seems to generate cheerfulness and sociability. For a few hours all life’s dubious problems are dropped in favor of the clear and congenial task of keeping alive.
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An editor is a person who knows more about writing than writers do but who has escaped the terrible desire to write.
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Only a person who is congenially self-centered has the effrontery and the stamina to write essays
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I admire anybody who has the guts to write anything at all.
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Always be on the lookout for the presence of wonder.
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No one should come to New York to live unless he is willing to be lucky.
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From morning till night, sounds drift from the kitchen, most of them familiar and comforting. . . . On days when warmth is the most important need of the human heart, the kitchen is the place you can find it; it dries the wet sock, it cools the hot little brain.
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We’re born, we live a little while, we die. A spider’s life can’t help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone’s life can stand a little of that.
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Loneliness is a strange gift.
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English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgment and education – sometimes it’s sheer luck, like getting across the street.
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Geese are friends to no one, they bad mouth everybody and everything. But they are companionable once you get used to their ingratitude and false accusations.
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Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.
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I am reminded of the advice of my neighbor. “Never worry about your heart till it stops beating.
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Every morning I awake torn between a desire to save the world and an inclination to savor it. This makes it hard to plan the day. But if we forget to savor the world, what possible reason do we have for saving it? In a way, the savoring must come first.
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Wilbur never forgot Charlotte. Although he loved her children and grandchildren dearly, none of the new spiders ever quite took her place in his heart. She was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.
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Make the work interesting and the discipline will take care of itself.
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I see nothing in space as promising as the view from a Ferris wheel.
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Nauseous. Nauseated. The first means “sickening to contemplate”; the second means “sick at the stomach.” Do not, therefore, say “I feel nauseous,” unless you are sure you have that effect on others.
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Understanding humor is like dissecting a live frog. It can be done, but the frog tends to die in the process.
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There is hardly a waiting room in the east that has not served as my cockpit, whether I was waiting to board a train or to see a dentist. And I am usually still trimming sheets when the train starts or drill begins to whine.
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A really companionable and indispensable dog is an accident of nature. You can’t get it by breeding for it, and you can’t buy it with money. It just happens along.
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Writing is one way to go about thinking, and the practice and habit of writing not only drain the mind but supply it, too.
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Reading is the work of the alert mind, is demanding, and under ideal conditions produces finally a sort of ecstasy.
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When you say something, make sure you have said it. The chances of your having said it are only fair.
E. B. WHITE