Quote

Each of us has been designed for one of two immortal functions, as either a storyteller or as a cross-legged listener to tales of wonder, love, and daring. When we cease to tell or listen, then we no longer exist as a people.

Bryce Courtenay

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Bryce Courtenay
Age: 79 †
Born: 1933
Born: January 1
Died: 2012
Died: November 22
Novelist
Johannesburg
Gauteng
South Africa
Arthur Bryce Courtenay
Listen
Designed
Longer
Immortal
Either
Tales
Legged
Wonder
Cease
Listener
Tell
Cross
Functions
Two
Crosses
Listeners
Love
Function
Storyteller
People
Exist
Daring

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It's not what a man does, it's what a man is that counts!
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Advertising seemed almost natural to me because it was a business where you had to inform, persuade and educate. And so from being a junior copywriter to being the creative director of one of the largest advertising agencies in the country took me 4.5 years, which is, well, a fairly spectacular rise.
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I'm going to die with my mind intact. And to me that is the most exciting way you could possibly die.
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I tell myself lies and soon I believe them.
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I have found in life that everything, no matter how bad, comes to an end.
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Inside all people there is love, also the need to take care of the other man who is his brother. Inside everyone is a savage, but there is also happening tenderness and compassion.
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You've got to be quick on your feet in this world if you want to survive. Though once you know the rules, it is not too hard to play the game.
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sometimes in life doing what we shouldn't do is the emergency
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People say I don't write books, I make Christmas presents.
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Sometimes, very occasionally, you do your best boxing with your mouth.
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But I was still alive, and in my book, where there's life, there's hope.
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I watch people get older and lose their intellectual acuity you lose that sharpness, that cleanness, that brain that you worked so hard on and that you were gifted with and lose the gifts that were given.
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Let me conclude by saying in my experience the glittering prizes in life come more to those who persevere despite setback and disappointment than they do to the exceptionally gifted who, with the confidence of the talents bestowed upon them, often pursue the tasks leading to success with less determination.
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. . . besides love, independence of thought is the greatest gift an adult can give a child.
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Sometimes the slightest things change the directions of our lives, the merest breath of a circumstance, a random moment that connects like a meteorite striking the earth. Lives have swiveled and changed direction on the strength of a chance remark.
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It is better just to get on with the business of living and minding your own business and maybe, if God likes the way you do things, he may just let you flower for a day or a night. But don't go pestering and begging and telling him all your stupid little sins, that way you will spoil his day.
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It's good to be a little frightened. It's good to respect your opponent. It keeps you sharp. In the fight game, the head rules the heart. But in the end the heart is the boss.
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Small can beat big, but you must have a plan.
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Pride is holding your head up when everyone around you has theirs bowed. Courage is what makes you do it.
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Your brain, Peekay, has two functions it is a place for original thought, but also it is a reference library. Use it to tell you where to look, and then you will have for yourself all the brains that have ever been
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