“There is something about a poet which leads us to believe that he died, in many cases, as long as 20 years before his birth.”

Well, if I called the wrong number, why did you answer the phone?

The most dangerous food is wedding cake.

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

A burden in the bush is worth two on your hands.

Somebody has said that woman’s place is in the wrong. That’s fine. What the wrong needs is a woman’s presence and a woman’s touch. She is far better equipped than men to set it right.

Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility.

If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons.

Progress was all right. Only it went on too long.

You might as well fall flat on your face as lean over too far backward.

The dog has got more fun out of Man than Man has got out of the dog, for the clearly demonstrable reason that Man is the more laughable of the two animals

It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers.

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.