A despot doesn’t fear eloquent writers preaching freedom- he fears a drunken poet who may crack a joke that will take hold.
E. B. WHITEIf a man is to be obsessed by something, I suppose a boat is as good as anything, perhaps a bit better than most.
More E. B. White Quotes
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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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A good farmer is nothing more nor less than a handy man with a sense of humus.
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Luck is not something you can mention in the presence of self-made men.
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In a free country it is the duty of writers to pay no attention to duty.
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I’ve got a new friend, all right. But what a gamble friendship is! Charlotte is fierce, brutal, scheming, bloodthirsty-everything I don’t like. How can I learn to like her, even though she is pretty and, of course, clever?
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Democracy is itself, a religious faith. For some it comes close to being the only formal religion they have.
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Writing is an act of faith, not a trick of grammar.
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And then, just as Wilbur was settling down for his morning nap, he heard again the thin voice that had addressed him the night before. “Salutations!” said the voice. Wilbur jumped to his feet. “Salu-what?” he cried. “Salutations!” repeated the voice.
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I have noticed that most men when they enter a barber shop and must wait their turn, drop into a chair and pick up a magazine. I simply sit down and pick up the thread of my sea wanderings, which began more than fifty years ago and is not quite ended.
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When you say something, make sure you have said it. The chances of your having said it are only fair.
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Trust me, Wilbur. People are very gullible. They’ll believe anything they see in print.
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Life is like writing with a pen. You can cross out your past but you can’t erase it.
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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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I see nothing in space as promising as the view from a Ferris wheel.
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A writer should concern himself with whatever absorbs his fancy, stirs his heart, and unlimbers his typewriter. … A writer has the duty to be good, not lousy: true, not false; lively, not dull; accurate, not full of error. He should tend to lift people up, not lower them down.
E. B. WHITE