WIST Quotations https://wist.info Wish I'd Said That! Fri, 24 Apr 2026 22:16:01 +0000 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 https://wist.info/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/little-w-little-box-60x60.jpg blurt – WIST Quotations https://wist.info 32 32 43606282 Palahniuk, Chuck -- Haunted (2005) https://wist.info/palahniuk-chuck/42893/ https://wist.info/palahniuk-chuck/42893/#respond Thu, 13 Aug 2020 19:26:08 +0000 Dave https://wist.info/?p=42893 People in France have a phrase: “Spirit of the Stairway.” In French: Esprit d’Escalier. It means that moment when you find the answer but it’s too late. So you’re at a party and someone insults you. You have to say something. So, under pressure, with everybody watching, you say something lame. But the moment you leave the party …

As you start down the stairway, then — magic. You come up with the perfect thing you should’ve said. The perfect crippling put down.

That’s the Spirit of the Stairway.

The trouble is, even the French don’t have a phrase for the stupid things you actually do say under pressure. Those stupid, desperate things you actually think or do.


Chuck Palahniuk (b. 1962) American novelist and freelance journalist
Haunted (2005)
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