Everything's a scandal. Dying's a scandal. But we all do it. Don DeLillo More Quotes by Don DeLillo More Quotes From Don DeLillo It takes close attention to see what is happening in front of you. It takes work, pious effort, to see what you are looking at. Don DeLillo happeningseffortattention The language of my books has shaped me as a man. Don DeLillo languagemenbook It was important for him to believe that he'd spent his life among people who kept missing the point. Don DeLillo missingbelievepeople Man's guilt in history and in the tides of his own blood has been complicated by technology, the daily seeping falsehearted death. Don DeLillo technologymenblood War is the form nostalgia takes when men are hard-pressed to say something good about their country. Don DeLillo menwarcountry Insanity's so personal. It's hard to know who shares our secrets. Don DeLillo secretshareinsanity How strange it is. We have these deep terrible lingering fears about ourselves and the people we love. Yet we walk around, talk to people, eat and drink. We manage to function. The feelings are deep and real. Shouldn't they paralyze us? How is it we can survive them, at least for a little while? We drive a car, we teach a class. How is it no one sees how deeply afraid we were, last night, this morning? Is it something we all hide from each other, by mutual consent? Or do we share the same secret without knowing it? Wear the same disguise? Don DeLillo realmorningnight The cheesecake was smooth and lush, with the personality of a warm and well-to-do uncle who knows a hundred dirty jokes and will die of sexual exertions in the arms of his mistress. Don DeLillo unclespersonalitydirty Years after I'd seen him for the last time I found myself thinking of him unexpectedly and often. You know how certain places grow powerful in the mind with passing time. In those early morning dreams when I come back to bed after a sleepy pee and fall quickly into the narrow end of the night, there is one set of streets I keep returning to, one dim mist of railroad rooms and certain figures reappear, borderline ghosts. Don DeLillo powerfuldreammorning He speaks in your voice, American, and there's a shine in his eye that's halfway hopeful. Don DeLillo voiceshiningeye Only a catastrophe gets our attention. We want them, we depend on them. As long as they happen somewhere else. This is where California comes in. Mud slides, brush fires, coastal erosion, mass killings, et cetera. We can relax and enjoy these disasters because in our hearts we feel that California deserves whatever it gets. Californians invented the concept of life-style. This alone warrants their doom. Don DeLillo erosionfireheart The less important you are in an office, the more they expect the happy smile. Don DeLillo happy-smileofficeimportant Stories are consoling, fiction is one of the consolation prizes for having lived in the world. Don DeLillo storiesfictionworld One connection I see between novelists and terrorists is that we both attempt to alter consciousness. Don DeLillo connectionsnovelistsconsciousness To be a tourist is to escape accountability. Errors and failings don't cling to you the way they do back home. You're able to drift across continents and languages, suspending the operation of sound thought. Tourism is the march of stupidity. Don DeLillo stupidityerrorshome Ecology is boring for the same reason that destruction is fun. Don DeLillo boringmodern-lifefun In a crisis the true facts are whatever other people say they are. Don DeLillo crisisfactspeople What good is knowledge if it just floats in the air? It goes from computer to computer. It changes and grows every second of every day. But nobody actually knows anything. Don DeLillo computergrowsair People think about who they are in the stillest hour of the night. Don DeLillo nightpeoplethinking In the American soul there is a lonely individual standing in a vast landscape. Don DeLillo landscapelonelysoul
