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History is bright and fiction dull with homely men who have charmed women.

O. Henry

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O. Henry
Age: 47 †
Born: 1862
Born: September 11
Died: 1910
Died: June 5
Journalist
Writer
Greensboro
North Carolina
William Sydney Porter
Olivier Henry
Oliver Henry
Bright
Dull
Fiction
History
Women
Men
Homely
Charmed

More quotes by O. Henry

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This fair but pitiless city of Manhattan was without a soul ... its inhabitants were manikins moved by wires and springs.
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If there ever was an aviary overstocked with jays it is that Yaptown-on-the-Hudson, call New York. Cosmopolitan they call it, you bet. So's a piece of fly-paper. You listen close when they're buzzing and trying to pull their feet out of the sticky stuff. Little old New York's good enough for us--that's what they sing.
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It was beautiful and simple, as truly great swindles are.
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The magi, as you know, were wise men wonderfully wise men who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents.
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Whenever he saw a dollar in another man's hands he took it as a personal grudge, if he couldn't take it any other way.
O. Henry
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The lonesomest thing in all the world is a soul when it is making ready to go on its mysterious, far journey.
O. Henry
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Greenwich Village... the village of low rents and high arts.
O. Henry
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The most notable thing about Time is that it is so purely relative. A large amount of reminiscence is, by common consent, conceded to the drowning man and it is not past belief that one may review an entire courtship while removing one's gloves.
O. Henry
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Life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.
O. Henry
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Now, girls, if you want to observe a young man hustle out after a pick and shovel, just tell him that your heart is in some other fellow's grave. Young men are grave-robbers by nature.
O. Henry
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Hospitality in the prairie country is not limited. Even if your enemy passes your way, you must feed him before you shoot him.
O. Henry
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There was clearly nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.
O. Henry
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Write what you like there is no other rule.
O. Henry
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In time truth and science and nature will adapt themselves to art. Things will happen logically, and the villain be discomfited instead of being elected to the board of directors. But in the meantime fiction must not only be divorced from fact, but must pay alimony and be awarded custody of the press despatches.
O. Henry
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It's said that love makes the world go around. Let me tell you, the announcement lacks verification. It's the wind from the dinner horn that does it.
O. Henry
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I'll give you the whole secret to short story writing. Here it is. Rule 1: Write stories that please yourself. There is no Rule 2.
O. Henry
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A burglar who respects his art always takes his time before taking anything else.
O. Henry
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Of habit, the power that keeps the earth from flying to pieces though there is some silly theory of gravitation.
O. Henry
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A story with a moral appended is like the bill of a mosquito. It bores you, and then injects a stinging drop to irritate your conscience.
O. Henry
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Take of London fog 30 parts malaria 10 parts, gas leaks 20 parts, dewdrops gathered in a brickyard at sunrise 25 parts odor of honeysuckle 15 parts. Mix. The mixture will give you an approximate conception of a Nashville drizzle.
O. Henry