Unfortunately, in real life there are no exact or final answers. In a job which must go ahead at a rapid pace we cannot withhold judgment “until all the facts are in.” Rarely is all the evidence at hand. Decisions must be made, and action taken, before complete knowledge can be acquired.
Hyman Rickover (1900-1986) Polish-American naval engineer, admiral [b. Chaim Gdala Rykower]
Speech (1954-03-16), “Administering a Large Military Development Project,” US Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California
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Quotations about:
real life
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
Few of us write great novels; all of us live them.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
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Some people see things that are and ask, Why? Some people dream of things that never were and ask, Why not? Some people have to go to work and don’t have time for all that shit.
The world as it stands is no illusion, no phantasm, no evil dream of a night; we wake up to it again for ever and ever; we can neither forget it nor deny it nor dispense with it.
Henry James (1843-1916) American writer
Essay (1874-04), “Iwan Turgéniew,” sec. 3, North American Review, Vol. 98, Art. 4
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Reviewing Ivan Turgenev's Frühlingsfluthen and Ein König Lear des Dorfes (1873). Collected in French Poets and Novelists, "Ivan Turgénieff," sec. 3 (1878)
What is saving my life now is the conviction that there is no spiritual treasure to be found apart from the bodily experiences of human life on earth. My life depends on engaging the most ordinary physical activities with the most exquisite attention I can give them. My life depends on ignoring all touted distinctions between the secular and the sacred, the physical and the spiritual, the body and the soul. What is saving my life now is becoming more fully human, trusting that there is no way to God apart from real life in the real world.
Barbara Brown Taylor (b. 1951) American minister, academic, author
An Altar in the World, Introduction (2009)
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One knows not whether nature doth not impose some secrecy upon him who has been privy to certain things. At least, it is to be doubted whether it be good to blazon such. If some books are deemed most baneful and their sale forbid, how, then, with deadlier facts, not dreams of doting men? Those whom books will hurt will not be proof against events. Events, not books, should be forbid.
So, what’s it like in the real world? Well, the food is better, but beyond that, I don’t recommend it.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Commencement Address, Kenyon College (20 May 1990)
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So this is the difference between telling a story and being in one, he thought numbly, the fear.
Patrick Rothfuss (b. 1973) American author
The Name of the Wind, ch. 6 “The Price of Remembering (2007)
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Anyone who wants to know the human psyche will learn next to nothing from experimental psychology. He would be better advised to [abandon exact science] put away his scholar’s gown, bid farewell to his study, and wander with human heart throughout the world. There in the horrors of prisons, lunatic asylums and hospitals, in drab suburban pubs, in brothels and gambling-hells, in the salons of the elegant, the Stock Exchanges, Socialist meetings, churches, revivalist gatherings and ecstatic sects, through love and hate, through the experience of passion in every form in his own body, he would reap richer stores of knowledge than text-books a foot thick could give him and he will know how to doctor the sick with a real knowledge of the human soul.
Experience is nearly always commonplace; the present is not romantic in the way the past is, and ideals and great visions have a way of becoming shoddy and squalid in practical life. Literature reverses this process.
Northrop Frye (1912-1991) Canadian literary critic and literary theorist
The Educated Imagination, Talk 3 “Giants in Time” (1963)
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If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn’t as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 8, Guards! Guards! (1989)
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Vimes, reflecting.
To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar. They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience: for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning, by study; and studies themselves, do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English philosopher, scientist, author, statesman
“Of Studies,” Essays, No. 50 (1625)
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The difference between life and the movies is that a script needs to make sense, and life doesn’t.
In a book, all would have gone according to plan. … but life was so fucking untidy — what could you say for an existence where some of your most crucial conversations of your life took place when you needed to take a shit, or something? An existence where there weren’t even any chapters?
Stephen King (b. 1947) American author
Misery (1987)
Oh, soon we’ll be out amid the cold world’s strife.
Soon we’ll be sliding down the razor blade of life.Tom Lehrer (b. 1928) American mathematician, satirist, songwriter
“Bright College Days,” An Evening (Wasted) with Tom Lehrer (1959)
Do not imagine that the knowledge, which I so much recommend to you, is confined to books, pleasing, useful, and necessary as that knowledge is: but I comprehend in it the great knowledge of the world, still more necessary than that of books. In truth, they assist one another reciprocally; and no man will have either perfectly, who has not both. The knowledge of the world is only to be acquired in the world and not in a closet. Books alone will never teach it you; but they will suggest many things to your observation, which might, otherwise escape you; and your own observations upon mankind, when compared with those which you will find in books, will help you to fix the true point.
Lord Chesterfield (1694-1773) English statesman, wit [Philip Dormer Stanhope]
Letter to his son, #112 (4 Oct 1746)
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Let the great book of the world be your principal study.
Lord Chesterfield (1694-1773) English statesman, wit [Philip Dormer Stanhope]
Letter to his son, #249 (7 Apr 1751)
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Studies themselves give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded by experience.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English philosopher, scientist, author, statesman
“Of Studies,” Essays, No. 50 (1625)
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The longer I live, the more I am satisfied of two things: first, that the truest lives are those that are cut rose-diamond-fashion, with many facets answering to the many-planed aspects of the world about them; secondly, that society is always trying in some way or other to grind us down to a single flat surface.
When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the World, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) American poet, essayist, scholar
Article (1860-01), “The Professor’s Story [Elsie Venner],” ch. 2, Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27
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Originally serialized as “The Professor’s Story,” but collected as the novel Elsie Venner, ch. 2 (1861).
Often misattributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson.
THE SERPENT: When you and Adam talk, I hear you say “Why?” Always “Why?” You see things; and you say, “Why?” But I dream things that never were; and I say, “Why not?”
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) Irish playwright and critic
Back to Methuselah: A Metabiological Pentateuch, Part 1 “In the Beginning,” Act 1, sec. 1 (1921)
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The Serpent speaking to Eve.
US President John Kennedy quoted this addressing the Irish Parliament, Dublin (1963-06-28). US Senator Robert Kennedy modified it for his campaign, as quoted by his brother, Senator Edward Kennedy in his eulogy for Robert (1968-06-08): "Some men see things as they are and say, why; I dream things that never were and say, why not?”
CALVIN (as he and Hobbes ride a wagon downhill): I think life should be more like TV.
CALVIN: I think all of life’s problems ought to be solved in thirty minutes with simple homilies, don’t you? I think weight and oral hygiene ought to be our biggest concerns.
CALVIN: I think we should all have powerful, high-paying jobs, and everyone should drive fancy sports cars. All our desires should be instantly gratified.
CALVIN (as the wagon flies off a cliff): Women should always wear tight clothes, and men should carry powerful handguns.
CALVIN (as he and Hobbes tumble in mid-air): Life overall should be more glamorous, thrill-packed, and filled with applause, don’t you think?
HOBBES (as they pick themselves up from the ground): I think my life is too featherbrained already.
CALVIN: Of course, if life was really like that, what would we watch on TV?
CALVIN: Reality continues to ruin my life.
