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In a man's middle years there is scarcely a part of the body he would hesitate to turn over to the proper authorities.

E. B. White

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E. B. White
Age: 86 †
Born: 1899
Born: July 11
Died: 1985
Died: October 1
Editor
Essayist
Journalist
Novelist
Poet
Screenwriter
Writer
Mount Vernon
New York
Elwyn Brooks White
E.B. White
Age
Hesitate
Turns
Authorities
Part
Scarcely
Body
Aging
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Middle

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Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness, natives give it solidity and continuity, but the settlers give it passion.
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Democracy is itself, a religious faith. For some it comes close to being the only formal religion they have.
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New York is to the nation what the white church spire is to the village - the visible symbol of aspiration and faith, the white plume saying the way is up!
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Deathlessness should be arrived at in a... haphazard fashion. Loving fame as much as any man, we shall carve our initials in the shell of a tortoise and turn him loose in a peat bog.
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Children hold spring so tightly in their brown fists-just as grownups, who are less sure of it, hold it in their hearts.
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Sometimes a writer, like an acrobat, must try a trick that is too much for him.
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... with men it's rush, rush, rush, every minute. I'm glad I'm a sedentary spider. What does sedentary mean? asked Wilbur. Means I sit still a good part of the time and don't go wandering all over creation. I know a good thing when I see it, and my web is a good thing. I stay put and wait for what comes. Gives me a chance to think.
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The essayist . . . can pull on any sort of shirt, be any sort of person, according to his mood or his subject matter - philosopher, scold, jester, raconteur, confidant, pundit, devil's advocate, enthusiast.
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I’ve got a new friend, all right. But what a gamble friendship is! Charlotte is fierce, brutal, scheming, bloodthirsty—everything I don’t like. How can I learn to like her, even though she is pretty and, of course, clever?
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A schoolchild should be taught grammar - for the same reason that a medical student should study anatomy. Having learned about the exciting mysteries of an English sentence, the child can then go forth and speak and write any damn way he pleases.
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In middle life, the human back is spoiling for a technical knockout and will use the flimsiest excuse, even a sneeze, to fall apart.
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As a writing man, or secretary, I have always felt charged with the safekeeping of all unexpected items of worldly and unworldly enchantment, as though I might be held personally responsible if even a small one were to be lost.
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It is easier for a man to be loyal to his club than to his planet the bylaws are shorter, and he is personally acquainted with the other members.
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New York blends the gift of privacy with the excitement of participation and better than most dense communities it succeeds in insulating the individual (if he wants it, and almost everybody wants or needs it) against all enormous and violent and wonderful events that are taking place every minute.
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Creation is in part merely the business of forgoing the great and small distractions.
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Humour plays close to the big, hot fire, which is the truth, and the reader feels the heat.
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Although there is no substitute for merit in writing, clarity comes closest to being one.
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The whole duty of a writer is to please and satisfy himself, and the true writer always plays to an audience of one.
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Television will enormously enlarge the eye's range, and, like radio, will advertise the Elsewhere. Together with the tabs, the mags, and the movies, it will insist that we forget the primary and the near in favor of the secondary and the remote.
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English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgment and education - sometimes it's sheer luck, like getting across the street.
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