Quote

To string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and sometimes purposeless way, and seem innocently unaware that they are absurdities, is the basis of the American art, if my position is correct.

Mark Twain

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Mark Twain
Age: 74 †
Born: 1835
Born: November 30
Died: 1910
Died: April 21
Aphorist
Author
Autobiographer
Humorist
Journalist
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Prosaist
Science Fiction Writer
Teacher
Florida
Missouri
Samuel Langhorne Clemens
Samuel L. Clemens
Samuel Clemens
Position
String
American
Absurdity
Incongruities
Art
Strings
Purposeless
Seems
Wander
Incongruity
Together
Correct
Innocently
Sometimes
Basis
Absurdities
Writing
Bases
Unaware
Way
Seem
Wandering

More quotes by Mark Twain

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You may have noticed that the less I know about a subject the more confidence I have, and the more new light I throw on it.
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It’s not the good that die young, it’s the lucky.
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No man that has ever lived has done a thing to please God--primarily. It was done to please himself, then God next.
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The more things are forbidden, the more popular they become.
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People are much more willing to lend you books than bookcases.
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Each season brings a world of enjoyment and interest in the watching of its unfolding, its gradual harmonious development, its culminating graces-and just as one begins to tire of it, it passes away and a radical change comes, with new witcheries and new glories in its train.
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A man's character may be learned from the adjectives which he habitually uses in conversation.
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Civilization largely consists in hiding human nature. When the barbarian learns to hide it we account him enlightened.
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The truth is a precious commodity. That's why I use it so sparingly.
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We have an insanity plea that would have saved Cain.
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I don't speak German well but several experts have assured me that I write it like an angel. Maybe so, maybe so- I don't know. I've not yet made any acquaintances among the angels. That comes later, whenever it please the Deity. I'm not in any hurry.
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Slang in a woman's mouth is not obscene, it only sounds so.
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The lightning there is peculiar it is so convincing, that when it strikes a thing it doesn't leave enough of that thing behind for you to tell whether-Well, you'd think it was something valuable, and a Congressman had been there.
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Familiarity breeds contempt. How accurate that is. The reason we hold truth in such respect is because we have so little opportunity to get familiar with it.
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I do not allow my schooling to interfere with my education
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And how moving is the eloquence of the untaught when it is the heart that is speaking!
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Truth is more of a stranger than fiction.
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Next you'd see a raft sliding by, away off yonder, and maybe a galoot on it chopping. . . you'd see the ax flash and come down-you don't hear nothing you see the ax go up again, and by the time it's above the man's head then you hear the k'chunk!-it had took all that time to come over the water.
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Education: that which reveals to the wise, and conceals from the stupid, the vast limits of their knowledge.
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When congress is in session no American is safe.
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