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The biggest laughs are based on the biggest disappointments and the biggest fears.

Kurt Vonnegut

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Kurt Vonnegut
Age: 84 †
Born: 1922
Born: November 11
Died: 2007
Died: April 14
Author
Essayist
Journalist
Novelist
Peace Activist
Philosopher
Playwright
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Writer
Indianapolis
Indiana
Kurt Vonnegut
Jr.
Laughs
Fears
Disappointment
Biggest
Based
Laughing
Writing
Disappointments

More quotes by Kurt Vonnegut

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If I should ever die, God forbid, I hope you will say, 'Kurt is up in heaven now.' That's my favorite joke.
Kurt Vonnegut
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I think jokes are a perfectly viable form of literature. Some critics take issue with me because I make my points and discuss my ideas with jokes, rather than with oceanic tragedy.
Kurt Vonnegut
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It goes against the American storytelling grain to have someone in a situation he can't get out of, but I think this is very usual in life.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Call me Jonah. My parents did, or nearly did. They called me John.
Kurt Vonnegut
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She believed, and was entitled to believe, I must say, that all human beings were evil by nature, whether tormentors or victims, or idle standers-by. They could only create meaningless tragedies, she said, since they weren't nearly intelligent enough to accomplish all the good they were meant to do.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
Kurt Vonnegut
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One thing I found out was that we need extended families. We need gangs. And, of course, if they're tribes and clans and so forth have been dispersed by the industrial revolution by people looking for work wherever they can find it. And a nuclear family, a man, a woman and kids and a dog and cat is no survival scheme at all. Horribly vulnerable.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Maybe they invited me because they know I have a tuxedo
Kurt Vonnegut
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We are all experiments in enthusiasms, narrow and preordained.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Of course I love you, So let's have a kid. Who will say exactly What its parents did Of course I love you, So let's have a kid. Who will say exactly What its parents did 'Of course I love you, So let's have a kid Who will say exactly What its parents did -' Et cetera. -NOBLE CLAGGETT (1947-1966)
Kurt Vonnegut
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Mark Twain was so good with crowds that he became, in competition with singers and dancers and actors and acrobats, one of the most popular performers of his time. It is so unusual, and so psychologically unlikely, too, for a great writer to be a great performer, too.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Start [writing] as close to the end as possible.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not.
Kurt Vonnegut
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It was very exciting for her, taking his dignity away in the name of love.
Kurt Vonnegut
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People who are wary of what they might find in a book if they opened one are right to be.
Kurt Vonnegut
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I didn't know then what a sperm was, and so wouldn't understand his answer for several years. My boy, he said, you are descended from a long line of determined, resourceful, microscopic tadpoles-- champions every one.
Kurt Vonnegut
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A committee of three can accomplish much if two don't show up.
Kurt Vonnegut
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There is nothing left of him but curiosity and a pair of eyes.
Kurt Vonnegut
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You know, I think the main purpose of the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps is to get poor Americans into clean, pressed, unpatched clothes, so rich Americans can stand to look at them.
Kurt Vonnegut
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Literature is the only art in which the audience performs the score.
Kurt Vonnegut