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... an era of turmoil and ideological confusion, the principal phenomenon of the present age.

Saul Bellow

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Saul Bellow
Age: 89 †
Born: 1915
Born: June 10
Died: 2005
Died: April 5
Author
Essayist
Novelist
University Teacher
Writer
Solomon Bellows
Turmoil
Ideological
Principal
Eras
Phenomenon
Confusion
Present
Age

More quotes by Saul Bellow

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I labor, I spend, I strive, I design, I love, I cling, I uphold, I give way, I envy, I long, I scorn, I die, I hide, I want. Faster, much faster than any man could make the tally.
Saul Bellow
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Is our species crazy? Plenty of evidence.
Saul Bellow
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When I didn't argue he was satisfied he had persuaded me, and was not the first to make that mistake.
Saul Bellow
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The best and purest human beings, from the beginning of time, have understood that life is sacred.
Saul Bellow
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The ocean was waiting with grand and bitter provocations, as if it invited you to think how deep it was, how much colder than your blood or saltier, or to outguess it, to tell which were its feints or passes and which its real intentions, meaning business.
Saul Bellow
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We are all such accidents. We do not make up history and culture. We simply appear, not by our own choice. We make what we can of our condition with the means available. We must accept the mixture as we find it - the impurity of it, the tragedy of it, the hope of it.
Saul Bellow
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Open discussion of many major public questions has for some time now been taboo. We can't open our mouths without being denounced as racists, misogynists, supremacists, imperialists or fascists. As for the media, they stand ready to trash anyone so designated.
Saul Bellow
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Boredom is an instrument of social control. Power is the power to impose boredom, to command stasis, to combine this stasis with anguish. The real tedium, deep tedium, is seasoned with terror and with death.
Saul Bellow
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A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.
Saul Bellow
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Hapiness can only be found if you can free yourself of all other distractions.
Saul Bellow
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A good novel is worth more then the best scientific study.
Saul Bellow
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Love is the most potent cosmetic.
Saul Bellow
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Live or die but don't poison everything.
Saul Bellow
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We mustn't forget how quickly the visions of genius become the canned goods of intellectuals.
Saul Bellow
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All human accomplishment has the same origin, identically. Imagination is a force of nature. Is this not enough to make a person full of ecstasy? Imagination, imagination, imagination.
Saul Bellow
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It seems hard for the American people to believe that anything could be more exciting than the times themselves. What we read daily and view on the TV has thrust imagined forms into the shadow. We are staggeringly rich in facts, in things, and perhaps, like the nouveau riche of other ages, we want our wealth faithfully reproduced by the artist.
Saul Bellow
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It seems, after all that there are no nonpeculiar people.
Saul Bellow
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You're all alone when you're a writer. Sometimes you just feel you need a humanity bath. Even a ride on the subway will do that. But it's much more interesting to talk about books. After all, that's what life used to be for writers: they talk books, politics, history, America. Nothing has replaced that.
Saul Bellow
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Conquered people tend to be witty.
Saul Bellow
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I am deeply moved when I write. I get turned on by it. I've never used any drugs for stimulation. I don't use words loosely. When I'm working and the right word comes, there is an answering resonance within me. There is also a hardness of intention that goes with it. There is no idleness in it.
Saul Bellow