John Updike quotes - page 11

[about the past, and Mary Ann, before Harry went to do his two years in the army] Maybe she sensed something about him. A loser. Though at eighteen he looked like a winner. (John Updike)
[Mim, to Nelson, after discussing Annabelle's stepfather being dead] "More and more is dead, are you old enough to notice? Vegas is dead, the way it was. [...] Now it's herds. Herds and herds of Joe Nobodies. Bozos. The hoi pollio, running up credit-card debt. Gambling is legal in half the states so they've built these huge moron-catchers along the Strip, all the way to the airport. A Pyramid, the Eiffel Tower, Venice – it's all here, Nelson, all for the morons. It's depressing as hell." View quote
John Updike
[A grandchild barely able to remember Harry's own mother] But can Ma be no more than that in this child's memory? Do we dwindle so fast to next to nothing? View quote
John Updike
[Nelson, re watching TV] He watches until he feels his intelligence being too rudely insulted or his patience being too arrogantly tested by the commercials... View quote
John Updike
I think books should have secrets, like people do. View quote
John Updike
Smaller than a breadbox, bigger than a TV remote, the average book fits into the human hand with a seductive nestling, a kiss of texture, whether of cover cloth, glazed jacket, or flexible paperback. View quote
John Updike
American art in general... takes to surreal exaggerations and metaphors; but its Puritan work ethic has little use for the playful self-indulgence behind Parisian Surrealism. View quote
John Updike
Creativity is merely a plus name for regular activity. Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right, or better. View quote
John Updike
To be a human being is to be in a state of tension between your appetites and your dreams, and the social realities around you and your obligations to your fellow man. View quote
John Updike
Gods don't answer letters. View quote
John Updike
It is in middles that extremes clash, where ambiguity restlessly rules. (John Updike)
Facts are generally overesteemed. For most practical purposes, a thing is what men think it is. When they judged the earth flat, it was flat. As long as men thought slavery tolerable, tolerable it was. We live down here among shadows, shadows among shadows. View quote
John Updike
Writing and rewriting are a constant search for what it is one is saying. View quote
John Updike
New York is of course many cities, and an exile does not return to the one he left. View quote
John Updike
Life is a razor, you are always in hot water or a scrape. View quote
John Updike
We're past the age of heroes and hero kings. ... Most of our lives are basically mundane and dull, and it's up to the writer to find ways to make them interesting. View quote
John Updike
Many men are more faithful to their golf partners than to their wives and have stuck with them longer. View quote
John Updike
Life is a nacho. It can be yummy-crunchy or squishy-yucky. It just depends on how long it takes for you to start eating it. View quote
John Updike
You cannot help but learn more as you take the world into your hands. Take it up reverently, for it is an old piece of clay, with millions of thumbprints on it. View quote
John Updike
Life is a video game. No matter how good you get, you are always zapped in the end. View quote
John Updike
Art imitates Nature in this not to dare is to dwindle. (John Updike)
Life is like an overlong drama through which we sit being nagged by the vague memories of having read the reviews. View quote
John Updike
Natural beauty is essentially temporary and sad hence the impression of obscene mockery which artificial flowers give us. View quote
John Updike
The crooked little tomato branches, pulpy and pale as if made of cheap green paper, broke under the weight of so much fruit there was something frantic in such fertility, a crying-out like that of children frantic to please. View quote
John Updike
The stripped and shapely Maple grieves The ghosts of her Departed leaves. The ground is hard, As hard as stone. The year is old, The birds are flown. View quote
John Updike