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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.

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
Never
Turns
Encountered
Half
Prayers
Night
Nine
Another
Eight
Might
Feet
Firsts
Turn
First
Prayer
Always
Five

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the scornful force of his tone turned the word into a curse
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Your war memories will be with you forever, you'll be asked about them thousands of times after the war is over. People will get their respect for you from that-partly from that, don't get me wrong-but if you can say that you were up front where there was some real shooting going on, then that will mean a whole lot to you in years to come.
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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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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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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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Exeter was, I suspect, more crucial in my life than in the lives of most members of my class, and conceivably, than in the lives of almost anyone else who ever attended the school.
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So the more things remain the same, the more they change after all.
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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.
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As I walked briskly out the road the wind knifed at my face, but this sun caressed the back of my neck.
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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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The best teaching I ever experienced was at Exeter. Yale was a distinct letdown afterward.
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All of them, all except Phineas, constructed at infinite cost to themselves these Maginot Lines against this enemy they thought they saw across the frontier, this enemy who never attacked that way-if he ever attacked at all if he was indeed the enemy.
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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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Everyone has a moment in history which belongs particularly to him.
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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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I did no know everything there was to know about myself, and knew that I did not know it.
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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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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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Stranded in this mill town railroad yard while the whole world was converging elsewhere, we seemed to be nothing but children playing among heroic men.
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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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