96 quotes found
American writer · American
Irish-American writer
“You have to study and learn so that you can make up your own mind. Stock your mind, stock your mind. It is your house of treasure and no one in the world can interfere with it. If you won the Irish...”
“I felt so happy I could barely stay in my skin”
“He sits in an old armchair in the corner covered with bits of blankets and a bucket behind the chair that stinks enough to make you sick and when you look at that old man in the dark corner you wan...”
“They said her duck recipe and the Chinese music were so dramatic everything else sounded anemic.”
“Rest your eyes and then read till they fall out of your head.”
“Limerick gained a reputation for piety, but we knew it was only the rain.”
“Just let them sit in the goddam sun. But the world won't let them because there's nothing more dangerous than letting old farts sit in the sun. They might be thinking. Same thing with kids. Keep 'e...”
“Stock your mind, stock your mind. It is your house of treasure and no one in the world can interfere with it.”
“He says, you have to study and learn so that you can make up your own mind about history and everything else but you can’t make up an empty mind. Stock your mind, stock your mind. You might be poor...”
“It’s lovely to know that the world can’t interfere with the inside of your head.”
“I don't know what it means and I don't care because it's Shakespeare and it's like having jewels in my mouth when I say the words.”
“Sing your song. Dance your dance. Tell your tale.”
“There’s no use saying anything in the schoolyard because there’s always someone with an answer and there’s nothing you can do but punch them in the nose and if you were to punch everyone who has an...”
“When I look back on my childhood I wonder how I survived at all. It was, of course, a miserable childhood: the happy childhood is hardly worth your while. Worse than the ordinary miserable childhoo...”
“I asked my dad what afflicted meant and he said 'Sickness son, and things that don't fit.'”
“I like the lemon meringue pie but I don't like the way Americans leave out the 'r' at the end of a word.”
“Why can't this priest go back to Los Angeles and leave me alone? Why is he taking me to lunch when he should be out there visiting the sick and the dying? That's what priests are for.”
“Why is it the minute I open my mouth the whole world is telling me they're Irish and we should all have a drink? It's not enough to be American. You always have to be something else, Irish-American...”
“I put my books in a bag because I don't care anymore if people in the subway look at me admiringly. I can't hold on to a girl, I can't keep an office job, I make a fool of myself in my first litera...”
“I'd like to stand up in those classes and announce to the world that I'm too busy to be Irish or Catholic or anything else, that I'm working day and night to make a living, trying to read books for...”
