Roger Rosenblatt > Quotes

“A library should be like a pair of open arms.”
― Roger Rosenblatt

“Why do we write?
"To make suffering endurable
To make evil intelligible
To make justice desirable
and . . . to make love possible”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Unless It Moves the Human Heart: The Craft and Art of Writing

“There may be no more pleasing picture in the world than that of a child peering into a book - the past and the future entrancing each other.”
― Roger Rosenblatt

“Be kind for everyone you meet carries a great burden.”
― Roger Rosenblatt

“Children love to be alone because alone is where they know themselves and where they dream.”
― Roger Rosenblatt

“Grief. The state of mind brought about when love, having lost to death, learns to breathe beside it. See also love.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Kayak Morning: Reflections on Love, Grief, and Small Boats

“Do not keep company with people who speak of careers. Not only are such people uninteresting in themselves; they also have no interest in anything interesting. . . . Keep company with people who are interested in the world outside themselves. The one who never asks you what you are working on; who never inquires as to the success of your latest project; who never uses the word career as a noun -- he is your friend.”
― Roger Rosenblatt

“In every heartbreak beauty intrudes.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Kayak Morning: Reflections on Love, Grief, and Small Boats

“But in the time since she died, I have been aware, every minute, of my love for her. She lives in my love.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Kayak Morning: Reflections on Love, Grief, and Small Boats

“Somewhere, I am sure, a calm, quiet place awaits me where I may do something worthwhile again. Another island, perhaps. Or a little cottage near the sea, far removed from developers, removed from Lapham. And, there is always Vermont. For everyone, in every time of despairing optimism, there is always Vermont.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Lapham Rising

“I'm going to kill Fairy Tale Dora and my little dog too.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Lapham Rising

“Never miss an opportunity to do nothing”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“Stay clear of anyone—other than a clergyman—who refers to God more than once in an hour One sees a growing number of professional moralists who appear on TV telling people what God wants of them. If these folks are right about God, it is splendid news, and one should follow them as if they were Moses. If, however, they have misinterpreted God's wishes—about political candidates, free expression, human reproduction, and other issues on which He is said to be communicating His opinions to a select few—or if these professional moralists have mistaken God's voice for, say, Elvis's, then paying attention to them may only lead to divine trouble. Better to play it safe and avoid such people. The danger in hanging around them is that God may be tired of listening to them misrepresent Him and decide to revert to His old bad-tempered tricks with locusts and floods. Of course, this being the 21st century, He may have refined His arsenal so that He can pick off only the offenders and leave the rest of us unharmed. But I would not count on this. God is good, but He may not be that good. ***”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“There is justice in a detective story, and none in madness. And while there is danger in a detective story, it eventually is put to rest, which distinguishes a detective story from life, where the mysteries are illimitable.   H”
― Roger Rosenblatt, The Boy Detective: A New York Childhood

“Anyone who feels inadequate to a position of authority will inevitably: a) trust the wrong people for advice; b) betray you at the drop of a name; c) mess up the whole enterprise and throw everyone into unemployment. Such people may not mean to do any of those things, but they are driven, night and day, by a fear of exposure. They know that they are inept; you know that they are inept; they know that you know it. Better always to work for a competent tyrant. I am self-employed.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“Life gets very dangerous if you play it defensively or fearfully. Michael Jordan said that he rarely got injured because he never played at half speed. Life is only rewarding if you play at full speed. It is not only more fun, it is also safer.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“I wonder if having a religion makes death easier to take, there being established, possibly protective formalities that attend it.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Making Toast: A Family Story

“About the Author Winner of a Robert F. Kennedy Book Prize, a Peabody Award, an Emmy, and two Polk awards, ROGER ROSENBLATT is University Professor of Writing at Long Island University Southampton College. He writes essays for Time magazine and for The News Hour with Jim Lehrer. He lives in Manhattan and Quogue, Long Island.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“My anger, being futile, flares in the wrong places and at the wrong times.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Making Toast: A Family Story

“Do not judge others by their dramatic moments—how they may panic or become nasty or wild in a crisis—in contrast to their much different normal behavior.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“made each other alert to the world’s surprises, pleasant, foolish, and tragic.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Making Toast: A Family Story

“Truman Capote on Jack Kerouac: "That's not writing, it's typing.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules For Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

“Who, after all, is more suited to the liberal life than the detective, who, by dint of his very profession, defies restrictions of government, of the police, and of conventional, predictable thinking? If in some ways detectives are also arch conservatives, in that they tame the behavior of their clients, indeed tame society itself, and make it orderly, still, they function according to their own rules of honor and justice arrived at independently. The private enterprise of the private op. Every detective story depends on their freedom of speculation without which no mystery can be solved. As”
― Roger Rosenblatt, The Boy Detective: A New York Childhood

“What keeps me from seeking Catherine’s help is that unlike other psychological problems, what happened to Amy, and to all of us, is real. The monster is real. And while there may be strategies that help Ginny and me feel a little better rather than a little worse, we will never feel right again. No analysis or therapy will change that.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Making Toast: A Family Story

“the scenes and moments that elbow their way to positions of prominence.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Thomas Murphy: A Bittersweet Irish Character Study of Aging, Loss, Friendship, and Love

“Male and Female Compatibility Rules: a. She's right. b. He's really thinking about nothing. Really.”
― Roger Rosenblatt, Rules for Aging: Resist Normal Impulses, Live Longer, Attain Perfection