A miracle to confound natural law, a baffling reversal of the inevitable consequences . . . a miracle. . . . An… — Tim O'Brien Cartoon Copy Share Image
“Though it's odd, you're never more alive than when you're almost dead. You recognize what's valuable. Freshly, as if for the first… — Tim O'Brien First time Copy Share Image
It was my view then, and still is, that you don't make war without knowing why. Knowledge of course, is always imperfect,… — Tim O'Brien Causes Copy Share Image
It was very sad, he thought. The things men carried inside. The things men did or felt they had to do. — Tim O'Brien Men Copy Share Image
They carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing--these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their… — Tim O'Brien Baggage Copy Share Image
“I detested their blind, thoughtless, automatic acquiescence to it all, their simpleminded patriotism, their prideful ignorance, their love-it-or-leave-it platitudes, how they were… — Tim O'Brien Honesty Copy Share Image
“Still there was so much to say. How the rain never stopped. How the cold worked into your bones. Sometimes the bravest… — Tim O'Brien Courage Copy Share Image
“A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor… — Tim O'Brien Habits Copy Share Image
In the attic, a warhead no doubt burns. Everything is combustible. Faith burns. Trust burns. Everything burns to nothing and even nothing… — Tim O'Brien Attics Copy Share Image
Inside I feel much like a 12-year-old or a 17-year-old who knows big words. — Tim O'Brien Big Copy Share Image
“Why do we care about Lizzie Borden, or Judge Crater, or Lee Harvey Oswald, or the Little Big Horn? Mystery! Because of… — Tim O'Brien God knows Copy Share Image
“He showed me how...See, he says he's going up through Laos, then into Burma, and then some other country, I forget, and… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
I'm skimming across the surface of my own history, moving fast, riding the melt beneath the blades, doing loops and spins, and… — Tim O'Brien Blades Copy Share Image
Why do our politicians put warnings on cigarette packs and not on their own foreheads? — Tim O'Brien Cigarette Copy Share Image
But I do like churches. The way it feels inside. It feels good when you just sit there, like you're in a… — Tim O'Brien Church Copy Share Image
“He felt crazy sometimes. Real depravity. Late at night an electric sizzle came into his blood, a tight pumped-up killing rage, and… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“My whole life seemed to spill out into the river, swirling away from me, everything I had ever been or ever wanted… — Tim O'Brien Life Copy Share Image
... when he kissed her, she received the kiss without returning it, her eyes wide open, not afraid, not a virgin's eyes,… — Tim O'Brien Detachment Copy Share Image
...precisely where the land touched water at high tide, where things came together but also separated. — Tim O'Brien Land Copy Share Image
