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I write humor the way a surgeon operates, because it is a livelihood, because I have a great urge to do it, because many interesting challenges are set up, and because I have the hope it may do some good.

James Thurber

Unless artists can remember what it was to be a little boy, they are only half complete as artist and as man.
JAMES THURBER

Artist Childhood Man Remember
A false or misunderstood word may create as much disaster as a sudden thoughtless act.
JAMES THURBER

Act Creation Fake Misunderstanding Thinking
Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility.
JAMES THURBER

Chaos Emotional Humor Remember Tranquility
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
The past is an old armchair in the attic, the present an ominous ticking sound, and the future is anybody’s guess.
JAMES THURBER

Future Guess Past Sound
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
There is no safety in numbers, or in anything else.
JAMES THURBER

Mathematics Safety
Man has gone long enough, or even too long, without being man enough to face the simple truth that the trouble with man is man.
JAMES THURBER

Enough Hard Time Man Simplicity Trouble Truth
There are two kinds of light – the glow that illuminates, and the glare that obscures.
JAMES THURBER

Deep Glow Illumination Kind Light
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
For one thing, she pronounced flowers ‘flars’ and I couldn’t let it slide.
JAMES THURBER

Accent Ignore Language Pronounce
One martini is all right. Two are too many, and three are not enough.
JAMES THURBER

Alcohol Drink Enough Right
Love is what you’ve been through with somebody.
JAMES THURBER

Break Up Love Yourself
When all things are equal, translucence in writing is more effective than transparency, just as glow is more revealing than glare.
JAMES THURBER

Effective Equality Reveal Writing
Things have dropped from me. I have outlived certain desires; I have lost friends, some by death… others through sheer inability to cross the street.
JAMES THURBER

Cross Desire Friendship Lost Street
Nowadays men lead lives of noisy desperation.
JAMES THURBER

Desperate Live Man Noisy

I write humor the way a surgeon operates, because it is a livelihood, because I have a great urge to do it, because many interesting challenges are set up, and because I have the hope it may do some good.

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I write humor the way a surgeon operates, because it is a livelihood, because I have a great urge to do it, because many interesting challenges are set up, and because I have the hope it may do some good.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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