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The writer wants to be understood much more than he wants to be respected or praised or even loved. And that, perhaps, is what makes him different from others.

Leo Rosten

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Leo Rosten
Age: 88 †
Born: 1908
Born: January 1
Died: 1997
Died: January 1
Lexicographer
Linguist
Novelist
Political Scientist
Screenwriter
Writer
Lodz
Leo Calvin Rosten
Even
Understood
Much
Perhaps
Writer
Wants
Loved
Makes
Others
Praised
Different
Respected

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The fellow who laughs last may laugh best, but he gets the reputation of being very slow-witted.
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Her cooking suggested she had attended the Cordon Noir.
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Everyone, in some small sacred sanctuary of the self, is nuts.
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Thinking is harder work than hard work.
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The purpose of life is to matter, to be productive, to have it make a difference that you lived at all-using the talents that God has given you for the betterment of others.
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Humor is, I think, the subtlest and chanciest of literary forms. It is surely not accidental that there are a thousand novelists, essayists, poets or journalists for each humorist. It is a long, long time between James Thurbers.
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O, to be sure, we laugh less and play less and wear uncomfortable disguises like adults, but beneath the costume is the child we always are, whose needs are simple, whose daily life is still best described by fairy tales.
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Humor is the affectionate communication of insight.
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You understand people better if you look at them-no matter how old or impressive or important they may be-as if they were children. For most men never mature they simply grow taller.
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Extremists think 'communication' means agreeing with them.
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Hope is ambiguous, but fear is precious.
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Satire is focused bitterness.
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Machines certainly can solve problems, store information, correlate, and play games - but not with pleasure.
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A writer writes not because he is educated but because he is driven by the need to communicate. Behind the need to communicate is the need to share. Behind the need to share is the need to be understood.
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You can learn much about life from a checker game: surrender one to take two don't make two moves at one time move up, not down and when you reach the top, you may move as you like.
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Proverbs often contradict one another, as any reader soon discovers. The sagacity that advises us to look before we leap promptly warns us that if we hesitate we are lost that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but out of sight, out of mind.
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What's green, hangs on a wall and whistles? [A Herring]
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Courage is the capacity to confront what can be imagined.
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The purpose of life is not to be happy, the purpose of life is to matter.
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Dogs are getting bigger, according to a leading dog manufacturer.
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