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In this world, goodness is destined to be defeated.

Walker Percy

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Walker Percy
Age: 73 †
Born: 1916
Born: May 28
Died: 1990
Died: May 10
Author
Novelist
Philosopher
Physician
Writer
Birmingham
Alabama
Destined
Defeated
Goodness
World

More quotes by Walker Percy

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Lord, grant that my work increase knowledge and help other men. Failing that, Lord, grant that it will not lead to man’s destruction. Failing that, Lord, grant that my article in Brain be published before the destruction takes place.
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As for hobbies, people with stimulating hobbies suffer from the most noxious of despairs since they are tranquilized in their despair.
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Life is fits and starts, mostly fits.
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A novel is what you call something that won't sell if you call it poems or short stories.
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What nuns don't realize is that they look better in nun clothes than J.C. Penney pantsuits.
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Why is it that no other species but man gets bored? Under the circumstances in which a man gets bored, a dog goes to sleep.
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In a word, the consumer of mass culture is lonely, not only lonely, but spiritually impoverished.
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Since grief only aggravates your loss, grieve not for what is past.
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To become aware of the possibility of the search is to be onto something.
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[In art] you are telling the reader or the listener or the viewer something he already knows but which he doesn't quite know that he knows, so that in the action of communication he experiences a recognition, a feeling that he has been there before, a shock of recognition.
Walker Percy
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Hatred strikes me as one of the few signs of life remaining in the world. This is another thing about the world which is upsidedown: all the friendly and likable people seem dead to me only the haters seem alive.
Walker Percy
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It is not a bad thing to settle for the Little Way, not the big search for the big happiness but the sad little happiness of drinks and kisses, a good little car and a warm deep thigh.
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Joy and sadness come by turns.
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Consciously cultivate the ordinary.
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Bourbon does for me what the piece of cake did for Proust.
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I sometimes think novelists write about sex in order to avoid boring themselves to death.
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There is no pain on this earth like seeing the same woman look at another man the way she once looked at you.
Walker Percy
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Bad books always lie. They lie most of all about the human condition.
Walker Percy
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Nothing remains but desire, and desire comes howling down Elysian Fields like a mistral.
Walker Percy
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For some time now the impression has been growing upon me that everyone is dead. It happens when I speak to people. In the middle of a sentence it will come over me: yes, beyond a doubt this is death. There is little to do but groan and make an excuse and slip away as quickly as one can.
Walker Percy