Wallace Stegner Quotes - Page 2

There must be some other possibility than death or lifelong penance ... some meeting, some intersection of lines; and some cowardly, hopeful geometer in my brain tells me it is the angle at which two lines prop each other up, the leaning-together from the vertical which produces the false arch. For lack of a keystone, the false arch may be as much as one can expect in this life. Only the very lucky discover the keystone.

Wallace Stegner

Wisdom. . .is knowing what you have to accept.

Wallace Stegner

The lessons of life amount not to wisdom, but to scar tissue and callus.

Wallace Stegner

Most things break, including hearts. The lessons of life amount not towisdom, but to scar tissue and callus.

Wallace Stegner

The flimsy little protestations that mark the front gate of every novel, the solemn statements that any resemblance to real persons living or dead is entirely coincidental, are fraudulent every time. A writer has no other material to make his people from than the people of his experience ... The only thing the writer can do is to recombine parts, suppress some characterisitics and emphasize others, put two or three people into one fictional character, and pray the real-life prototypes won't sue.

Wallace Stegner

wherever you find the greatest good, you will find the greatest evil, because evil loves paradise as much as good.

Wallace Stegner