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A man may debar nonsense from his library of reason, but not from the arena of his impulses.

Rex Stout

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Rex Stout
Age: 88 †
Born: 1886
Born: December 1
Died: 1975
Died: October 27
Novelist
Radio Personality
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Writer
Noblesville
Indiana
Impulse
Library
May
Reason
Men
Impulses
Arena
Nonsense

More quotes by Rex Stout

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I love to make a mistake. It is my only assurance that I cannot reasonably be expected to assume the responsibility of omniscience.
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The only two kinds of books could earn an American writer a living are cookbooks and detective novels.
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One of the hardest things to believe is that anyone will abandon the effort to escape a charge of murder. It is extremely important to suspend disbelief on that. If you don't, the story is spoiled.
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The requisitions of the income tax have added greatly to the attractions of mercenary crime.
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In a world that operates largely at random, coincidences are to be expected, but any one of them must always be mistrusted.
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I have a strong moral sense - by my standards.
Rex Stout
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What do I believe in? Belief means faith, and there's only one damned thing in the world I have any faith in. That's the idea of American democracy, because it seems to me so obvious that that's the only sensible way to run human affairs.
Rex Stout
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Everything in a story should be credible.
Rex Stout
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It is always wiser, where there is a choice, to trust inertia. It is the greatest force in the world.
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If I'm home with no chore at hand, and a package of books has come, the television set and the chess board and the unanswered mail will have to manage without me if one of the books is a detective story.
Rex Stout
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To say that a man is a reasoning animal is a very different thing than to say that most of man's decisions are based on his rational process. That I don't believe at all.
Rex Stout
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Wolfe scowled at her. I could see he was torn with conflicting emotions. A female in his kitchen was an outrage. A woman criticizing his or Fritz's cooking was an insult. But corned beef hash was one of life's toughest problems, never yet solved by anyone.
Rex Stout
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Hemingway never grew out of adolescence. His scope and depth stayed shallow because he had no idea what women are for.
Rex Stout
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God made you and me, in certain respects, quite unequal, and it would be futile to try any interference with His arrangements.
Rex Stout
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No man should tell a lie unless he is shrewd enough to recognize the time for renouncing it, if and when it comes, and knows how to renounce it gracefully.
Rex Stout
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A Dickens character to me is a theatrical projection of a character. Not that it isn't real. It's real, but in that removed sense. But Sherlock Holmes is simply there. I would be astonished if I went to 221½ B Baker Street and didn't find him.
Rex Stout
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I love books, food, music, sleep, people who work, heated arguments, the United States of America, and my wife and children. I dislike politicians, preachers, genteel persons, people who do not work or are on vacation, closed minds, movies, loud noises, and oiliness.
Rex Stout
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I understand the technique of eccentricity it would be futile for a man to labor at establishing a reputation for oddity if he were ready at the slightest provocation to revert to normal action.
Rex Stout
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I still can't decide which is more fun - reading or writing.
Rex Stout
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I will ride my luck on occasion, but I like to pick the occasion.
Rex Stout