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Looking back now across fifteen years I could see with great clarity the fear I had lived in, which must mean that in the interval I had succeeded in a very important undertaking: I must have made my escape from it.

John Knowles

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John Knowles
Age: 75 †
Born: 1926
Born: September 16
Died: 2001
Died: November 29
Journalist
Novelist
Writer
Fairmont
West Virginia
Important
Escape
Great
Across
Interval
Made
Lived
Undertaking
Years
Looking
Undertakings
Fear
Intervals
Back
Succeeded
Must
Fifteen
Mean
Clarity

More quotes by John Knowles

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My father was in the coal business in West Virginia. Both dad and mother were, however, originally from Massachusetts New England, to them, meant the place to go if you really wanted an education.
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But I was used to finding something deadly in things that attracted me there was always something deadly lurking in anything I wanted, anything I loved.
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So the more things remained the same, the more they changed after all. Nothing endures. Not love, not a tree, not even a death by violence.
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So the more things remain the same, the more they change after all.
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You have to do what you think is the right thing, but just make sure it’s the right thing in the long run, and not just for the moment.
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Never say you are five feet nine when you are five feet eight and a half was the first one I encountered. Another was, Always say some prayers at night because it might turn out that there is a God.
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As I said, this was my sarcastic summer. It was only long after that I recognized sarcasm as the protest of people who are weak.
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Sarcasm... the protest of those who are weak.
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It is a sad day when one looks back and sees that his largest regrets have become some of the most integral elements of his dreams.
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I felt that I was not, never had been and never would be a living part of this overpoweringly solid and deeply meaningful world around me.
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The next major advance in the health of the American people will be determined by what the individual is willing to do for himself.
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But something held me back. Perhaps I was stopped by that level of feeling, deeper than thought, which contains the truth.
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Nothing endures. Not a tree. Not love. Not even death by violence.
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I never killed anybody and I never developed an intense level of hatred for the enemy. Because my war ended before I ever put on a uniform I was on active duty all my time at school I killed my enemy there.
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Everyone has a moment in history which belongs particularly to him.
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What I mean is, I love winter, and when you really love something, then it loves you back, in whatever way it has to love.
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It was demeaning to scrape affection from virtually everyone you encountered. That was immature.
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I began to know that each morning reasserted the problems of night before, that sleep suspended all but changed nothing, that you couldn’t make yourself over between dawn and dusk.
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The best teaching I ever experienced was at Exeter. Yale was a distinct letdown afterward.
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There are simply more young people than there ever were. You get this feeling of strength. Also, large numbers can be a drawback, making it difficult to lose one's anonymity.
John Knowles