“Boys are beyond the range of anybody’s sure understanding, at least when they are between the ages of 18 months and 90 years.”

I don’t believe the writer should know too much where he’s going. If he does, he runs into old man blueprint—old man propaganda.

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.

I am not a cat man, but a dog man, and all felines can tell this at a glance – a sharp, vindictive glance.

Writers of comedy have outlook, whereas writers of tragedy have, according to them, insight.

Sixty minutes of thinking of any kind is bound to lead to confusion and unhappiness.

Don’t get it right, just get it written.

The things we laugh at are awful while they are going on, but get funny when we look back. And other people laugh because they’ve been through it too. The closest thing to humor is tragedy.

Women are wiser than men because they know less and understand more.

The wit makes fun of other persons; the satirist makes fun of the world; the humorist makes fun of himself.

Humor and pathos, tears and laughter are, in the highest expression of human character and achievement, inseparable.

I do not have a psychiatrist and I do not want one, for the simple reason that if he listened to me long enough, he might become disturbed.

There are two kinds of light – the glow that illuminates, and the glare that obscures.

Reason is 6/7 of treason.

There is no safety in numbers, or in anything else.

The nation that complacently and fearfully allows its artists and writers to become suspected rather than respected is no longer regarded as a nation possessed with humor or depth.

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.

All I try to do is create an atmosphere that seems comfortable enough, that it removes tension and everyone feels free. If they feel free then behaviour happens, small moments happen and that’s what ultimately works the best for me.

Being judgmental about your own behavior is actually another cop-out because it makes you feel as though you’re doing something virtuous.

Human behavior is timeless.

How do you change your behavior? Change what you worship

Live so that you can at least get the benefit of the doubt.

The alcoholic and the drug addict harm only themselves by their behavior; the person who violates the rules of morality governing mans life in society harms not only himself, but everyone.

Suffering is nature’s way of indicating a mistaken attitude or way of behavior, and to the nonegocentric person every moment of suffering is the opportunity for growth. People should rejoice in suffering, strange as it sounds, for this is a sign of the availability of energy to transform their characters.

The day is not far off when the economic problem will take the back seat where it belongs, and the arena of the heart and the head will be occupied or reoccupied, by our real problems – the problems of life and of human relations, of creation and behavior and religion.