I paraphrase Aristotle: If you want to be comical, write about people to whom the audience can feel superior; if you want… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
We are America's Great Lakes people, her freshwater people, not an oceanic but a continental people. Whenever I swim in an ocean,… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
If there really had been a Mercutio, and if there really were a Paradise, Mercutio might be hanging out with teenage Vietnam… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
People stopped calling themselves Freethinkers because it was so specifically German and anything German was terribly unpopular because of the two world… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Shortridge High School was an elitist high school. In a way it was a scandal because you could go there no matter… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
It's an astonishing skill that people can read, and read well. Very few people can read well. For instance, I have to… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
About astrology and palmistry: they are good because they make people vivid and full of possibilities. They are communism at its best.… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Why throw money at problems? That is what money is for. Should the nation's wealth be redistributed? It has been and continues… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
All the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I'm eighty-three and homeless. It was the same when World War II ended. The Army kept me on because I could type,… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
America is the wealthiest nation on Earth, but its people are mainly poor, and poor Americans are urged to hate themselves… It… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres, and that the news of… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
People are only animals, but special animals. Every animal has fought and killed to survive, even before the dinosaurs. We're the only… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“The biggest truth to face now – what is probably making me unfunny now for the remainder of my life – is… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I love cell phones. I see people so happy and proud, walking around. Gesturing, you know. I'm like Karl Marx, I'm up… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before," Bokonon tells us.… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I hope that my ideas attract a lively dialogue, even if my sentences are simple. Simple sentences have always served me well.… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
That's the secret of how to enjoy writing and how to make yourself meet high standards," said Mrs. Berman. "You don't write… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
The right of the people to peacefully assemble and petition their government for a redress of grievances is now worth a pitcher… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Indianapolis, Indiana is the first place in the United States of America where a white man was hanged for the murder of… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I can see where influential people would like Maharishi better than Jesus. My God, if the Beatles and Mia Farrow went to… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Perhaps some people really are born unhappy. I surely hope not. Speaking for my sister and myself: We were born with the… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“The library is full of stories of supposed triumphs which makes me very suspicious of it. It's misleading for people to read… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Any man who would change the World in a significant way must have showmanship, a genial willingness to shed other people's blood,… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
The two real political parties in America are the Winners and the Losers. The people don't acknowledge this. They claim membership in… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Still and all, why bother? Here's my answer. Many people need desperately to receive this message: I feel and think much as… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I just know that there are plenty of people who are in terrible trouble and can't get out. And so I'm impatient… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Sometimes I wonder if he wasn't born dead. I never met a man who was less interested in the living. Sometimes I… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
The Circle Theatre, black people had to sit in the balcony. Any theater with a balcony, black people had to sit up… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
I wish that people who are conventionally supposed to love each other would say to each other, when they fight, "Please -… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Oh, a lion hunter in the jungle dark, And a sleeping drunkard up in central park, and a Chinese dentist and a… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
People have to talk about something just to keep their voice boxes in working order so they'll have good voice boxes in… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before. He is full… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share Image
“You must bloom as a writer and I must bloom as a painter. Everything else about us is uninteresting.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“Have a good nap, did you?” said the porter. “Yes,” said Billy. “Man,” said the porter, “you sure had a hard-on.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“I told him that if we doubted that we are demons in Hell, he should read The Mysterious Stranger, which Mark Twain wrote in… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“Thomas Jefferson High School [..] His high school was named after a slave owner who was also one of the world’s greatest theoreticians on… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“I had a certain amount of skill as a dramatist, and Dr. Goebbels wanted me to use it” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
I was some of the mud that got to sit up and look around. Lucky me, lucky mud. — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“The town was Newport, Rhode Island, U.S.A., Earth, Solar System, Milky Way.” — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“Her face was one of a kind, a surprising variation that made observers think, Yes--that would be another very nice way for people to… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“You finally fell in love, I see,” said Salo. “Only an Earthling year ago,” said Constant. “It took us that long to realize that… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“Like all Earthlings at the point of death, Mary Young sent faint reminders of herself to those who had known her. She released a… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“And contrast Mary Kathleen, if you will, with my wife Ruth, the Ophelia of the death camps, who believed that even the most intelligent… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
Someday, someday, this crazy world will have to end, And our God will take things back that He to us did lend. And if,… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
“There are plenty of good reasons for fighting," I said, "but no good reason ever to hate without reservation, to imagine that God Almighty… — Kurt Vonnegut Copy Share
