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Babies who have not yet been taught to speak any language are the only race of the earth, the race of man: all the rest is pretence, what we call civilization, hatred, fear, desire for strength.

William Saroyan

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William Saroyan
Age: 72 †
Born: 1908
Born: August 31
Died: 1981
Died: May 18
Dramatist
Novelist
Playwright
Poet
Screenwriter
Songwriter
Writer
Fresno
California
Language
Hatred
Desire
Civilization
Fear
Baby
Speak
Strength
Earth
Rest
Men
Taught
Call
Pretence
Race
Babies

More quotes by William Saroyan

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There is a small area of land in Asia Minor that is called Armenia, but it is not so. It is not Armenia. It is a place. There are only Armenians, and they inhabit the earth, not Armenia, since there is no Armenia. There is no America and there is no England, and no France, and no Italy. There is only the earth.
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If you're alive, you can't be bored in San Francisco. If you're not alive, San Francisco will bring you to life......San Francisco is a world to explore. It is a place where the heart can go on a delightful adventure. It is a city in which the spirit can know refreshment every day.
William Saroyan
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San Francisco is a world to explore. It is a place where the heart can go on a delightful adventure.
William Saroyan
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The people you like when you meet them and while you know them, and the people you remember fondly, are invariably people who have a sense of comedy, not just a sense of humor.
William Saroyan
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I don't think my writing is sentimental, although it is a very sentimental thing to be a human being.
William Saroyan
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My work has always been the product of my time.
William Saroyan
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The people you hate, well, this is the question about such people: why do you hate them?
William Saroyan
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In the most commonplace, tiresome, ridiculous, malicious, coarse, crude, or even crooked people or events I had to seek out rare things, good things, comic things, and I did so.
William Saroyan
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What can a man do to move along in some kind of grace through his days and years?
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We get very little wisdom from success, you know.
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Love doesn't have to be perfect. Even perfect, it is still the best thing there is, for the simple reason that it is the most common and constant truth of all, of all life, all law and order, the very thing which holds everything together, which permits everything to move along in time and be its wonderful or ordinary self.
William Saroyan
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Nobody, but nobody, is going to tell me I'm not the most. I am. I was the most when everybody else was struggling bitterly to become a little.
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Writers are a fascinating breed, because there are so many kinds of them, they are made by so many circumstances, conditions, and mysteries, and there are so many ways for writing to be done.
William Saroyan
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To Armenians, half Armenians, quarter Armenians, and one-eight Armenians. Sixteen and thirty-second Armenians, and other winners, are likelier to be happy with a useful book
William Saroyan
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Remember that every man is a variation of yourself
William Saroyan
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What my children appear to be on the surface is no matter to me. I am fooled neither by gracious manners nor by bad manners. I am interested in what is truly beneath each kind of manners...I want my children to be people- each one separate- each one special- each one a pleasant and exciting variation of all the others
William Saroyan
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What is a street? It is where the living weep, where the dead go off in silence to their peace.
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Every artist is in everything he creates, and indeed if the truth is told, every person is in his life, in his work, whatever his work may be, and this is visible in his face, figure, stance, movement, and totality.
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Armenag Saroyan was the failed poet, the failed Presbyterian preacher, the failed American, the failed theological student.
William Saroyan
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Sometimes the most intelligent thing is not to do anything, certainly nothing loaded with the imbecility of emotionality.
William Saroyan