Quote

Why is the awfulness of families such a popular reason for starting another?

Peter De Vries

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Peter De Vries
Age: 83 †
Born: 1910
Born: February 27
Died: 1993
Died: September 28
Editor
Novelist
Writer
Chicago
Illinois
Awfulness
Families
Popular
Starting
Another
Reason

More quotes by Peter De Vries

Image
This human nature is shabby stuff, as you may know from introspection.
Peter De Vries
Image
Mrs Thicknesse and I agreed that a business of his own was probably the only solution for him because he was obviously unemployable.
Peter De Vries
Image
There are times when breakfast seems the one thing worth getting up for.
Peter De Vries
Image
The trouble with treating people as equals is that the first thing you know they may be doing the same thing to you.
Peter De Vries
Image
People rarely do what they don't want to.
Peter De Vries
Image
What we are assigned to bear is in a sense a measure of our stature.
Peter De Vries
Image
I suppose I shall marry eventually One does that, one drifts into stability
Peter De Vries
Image
What baffles me is the comfort people find in the idea that somebody dealt this mess. Blind and meaningless chance seems to me so much more congenial - or at least less horrible. Prove to me that there is a God and I will really begin to despair.
Peter De Vries
Image
Marriage has driven more than one man to sex.
Peter De Vries
Image
We are nothing but a string of gut on a stick of bone riding this piece of astral soot for one piteous splinter of eternity.
Peter De Vries
Image
You ought to be ashamed, a woman in an Easter bonnet told Stein. Your race gave us our religion... From ancient polytheism, the belief in lots of gods, the woman continued a little more eruditely, the Hebrew nation led us on to the idea that there is only one. Which is just a step from the truth, said Stein.
Peter De Vries
Image
Rather than waste precious time arguing, I went up and started serving my sentence without delay. It was usually about an hour for epigrams somewhat longer for a paradox.
Peter De Vries
Image
I made a tentative conclusion. It seemed from all of this that uppermost among human joys is the negative one of restoration: not going to the stars, but learning that one may stay where one is.
Peter De Vries
Image
I tried to write worse but it was no good my generalizations came out as before, each more exquisite than the last. I grew discouraged.
Peter De Vries
Image
There are times when parenthood seems nothing more than feeding the hand that bites you.
Peter De Vries
Image
The rich aren't like us, they pay less taxes.
Peter De Vries
Image
Do you believe in astrology? -I don't even believe in astronomy.
Peter De Vries
Image
Celibacy is the worst form of self-abuse.
Peter De Vries
Image
I wondered whether any woman could be happy with a man who says 'folderol'.
Peter De Vries
Image
I am not impressed by the Ivy League establishments. Of course they graduate the best -- it's all they'll take, leaving to others the problem of educating the country. They will give you an education the way the banks will give you money -- provided you can prove to their satisfaction that you don't need it.
Peter De Vries