WIST Quotations

Keillor, Garrison -- “Congress’s Shameful Retreat From American Values,” Chicago Tribune (4 Oct 2006)

Dave — Thu, 08 Jan 2015 13:50:45 +0000

If the government can round up someone and never be required to explain why, then it’s no longer the United States of America as you and I always understood it. Our enemies have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. They have made us become like them.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“Congress’s Shameful Retreat From American Values,” Chicago Tribune (4 Oct 2006)
(Source)

Keillor, Garrison -- “Could I Have Been Any More Inept?” Salon.com (26 Oct 1999)

Dave — Sat, 27 Jul 2019 02:03:45 +0000

A man can’t eat anger for breakfast and sleep with it at night and not suffer damage to his soul.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“Could I Have Been Any More Inept?” Salon.com (26 Oct 1999)
(Source)

Keillor, Garrison -- “Easter,” Leaving Home (1987)

Dave — Thu, 23 Oct 2014 12:41:31 +0000

Nothing you do for children is ever wasted. They seem not to notice us, hovering, averting our eyes, and they seldom offer thanks, but what we do for them is never wasted.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“Easter,” Leaving Home (1987)
(Source)

Keillor, Garrison -- “Post to the Host” (Jul 2005)

Dave — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 13:53:40 +0000

Journalism is a good place for any writer to start — the retelling of fact is always a useful trade and can it help you learn to appreciate the declarative sentence. A young writer is easily tempted by the allusive and ethereal and ironic and reflective, but the declarative is at the bottom of most good writing.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“Post to the Host” (Jul 2005)
(Source)

Keillor, Garrison -- “The Floating Village,” New York Times (2010-01-06)

Dave — Mon, 18 Mar 2024 14:09:09 +0000

Vacation cruises are advertised as luxurious journeys to exotic places, but a chief pleasure is the reading of books [….] On steamer chairs topside or poolside, in the lounges, everywhere you see men and women with their noses in books, devouring them for hours. The Book: Man’s Chief Weapon Against Tedium. Woman’s too.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“The Floating Village,” New York Times (2010-01-06)
(Source)

Keillor, Garrison -- “The Meaning of Life,” We Are Still Married (1989)

Dave — Thu, 30 Oct 2014 12:21:56 +0000

When the country goes temporarily to the dogs, cats must learn to be circumspect, walk on fences, sleep in trees, and have faith that all this woofing is not the last word.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“The Meaning of Life,” We Are Still Married (1989)

Keillor, Garrison -- “The Meaning of Life,” We Are Still Married (1989)

Dave — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 13:31:06 +0000

Gentleness is everywhere in daily life, a sign that faith rules through ordinary things: through cooking and small talk, through storytelling, making love, fishing, tending animals and sweet corn and flowers, through sports, music and books, raising kids — all the places where the gravy soaks in and grace shines through.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“The Meaning of Life,” We Are Still Married (1989)

Keillor, Garrison -- “The Meaning of Life,” We Are Still Married (1989)

Dave — Thu, 20 Nov 2014 13:43:30 +0000

Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“The Meaning of Life,” We Are Still Married (1989)

Keillor, Garrison -- “The Old Scout,” The Writer’s Almanac (4 Oct 2005)

Dave — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 13:21:09 +0000

There is almost no marital problem that can’t be helped enormously by taking off your clothes.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“The Old Scout,” The Writer’s Almanac (4 Oct 2005)

Keillor, Garrison -- “We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore,” In These Times (26 Aug 2004)

Dave — Thu, 06 Nov 2014 12:54:21 +0000

The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
“We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore,” In These Times (26 Aug 2004)
(Source)

Keillor, Garrison -- (Attributed)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
(Attributed)

Keillor, Garrison -- (Attributed)

Dave — Wed, 24 Sep 2014 14:21:52 +0000

We have a backstage view of ourselves and a third-row view of everybody else.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
(Attributed)

Keillor, Garrison -- (Attributed)

Dave — Thu, 18 Dec 2014 13:40:33 +0000

I think the most un-American thing you can say is, “You can’t say that.”

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
(Attributed)

Keillor, Garrison -- Happy to be Here (1983)

Dave — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 12:41:40 +0000

God writes a lot of comedy, Donna; the trouble is, he’s stuck with so many bad actors who don’t know how to play funny.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
Happy to be Here (1983)

Keillor, Garrison -- Lake Wobegon Days (1985)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you have, which once you have got it you may be smart enough to see is what you would have wanted had you known.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
Lake Wobegon Days (1985)

Keillor, Garrison -- Lake Wobegon Days (1985)

Dave — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 12:33:36 +0000

I think if the church put in half the time on covetousness that it does on lust, this would be a better world for all of us.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
Lake Wobegon Days (1985)

Keillor, Garrison -- Leaving Home? (1987)

Dave — Thu, 16 Oct 2014 12:05:13 +0000

Selective ignorance, a cornerstone of child rearing. You don’t put kids under surveillance: it might frighten you. Parents should sit tall in the saddle and look upon their troops with a noble and benevolent and extremely nearsighted gaze.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
Leaving Home? (1987)

Keillor, Garrison -- The Book of Guys (1993)

Dave — Thu, 15 Jan 2015 13:06:39 +0000

Girls … were allowed to play in the house … and boys were sent outdoors. … Boys ran around in the yard with toy guns going kksshh-kksshh, fighting wars for made-up reasons and arguing about who was dead, while girls stayed inside and played with dolls, creating complex family groups and learning how to solve problems through negotiation and roleplaying. Which gender is better equipped, on the whole, to live an adult life, would you guess?

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
The Book of Guys (1993)

Keillor, Garrison -- The Book of Guys, Introduction (1993)

Dave — Thu, 01 Jan 2015 18:38:06 +0000

The father of a daughter is nothing but a high-class hostage. A father turns a stony face to his sons, berates them, shakes his antlers, paws the ground, snorts, runs them off into the underbrush, but when his daughter puts her arm over his shoulder and says, “Daddy, I need to ask you something,” he is a pat of butter in a hot frying pan.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
The Book of Guys, Introduction (1993)

Keillor, Garrison -- In New York Times (30 Mar 1990)

Dave — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 08:50:20 +0000

My ancestors were Puritans from England. They arrived here in 1648 in the hope of finding greater restrictions than were permissible under English law at that time.

Garrison Keillor (b. 1942) American entertainer, author
In New York Times (30 Mar 1990)