They were...well, Beautiful People! - not 'students', 'clerks', 'salesgirls', 'executive trainees' - Christ, don't give me your occupation-game labels! We are Beautiful People, ascendant from your robot junkyard. Tom Wolfe More Quotes by Tom Wolfe More Quotes From Tom Wolfe Not long after I published my first book, I quickly found I was terrible at being interviewed. Tom Wolfe long book firsts Radical Chic, after all, is only radical in Style; in its heart it is part of Society and its traditions. Tom Wolfe tradition style heart Television reporters aren't really called reporters. They are called researchers. And that's really all they are. Tom Wolfe researchers reporters television There was a time in the 1930s when magazine writers could actually make a good living. 'The Saturday Evening Post' and 'Collier's' both had three stories in each issue. These were usually entertaining, and people really went for them. But then television came along, and now of course, information technology...the new way of killing time. Tom Wolfe issues technology people Vietnam was really an idealistic thing to stop the spread of communism, which, incidentally, it did. It was a pretty costly way to do it, but it achieved its goal. Tom Wolfe vietnam goal way By the time I received my doctorate in American studies in 1957, I was in the twisted grip of a disease of our times in which the sufferer experiences an overwhelming urge to join the 'real world.' So I started working for newspapers. Tom Wolfe overwhelming-urge real world Even hostile parodies admit from the start that the target has a distinct voice. Tom Wolfe parody target voice Carol Doda's Breasts are up there the way one imagines Electra's should have been, two incredible mammiform protrusions, no mere pliable mass of feminine tissues and fats there but living arterial sculpture––viscera spigot––great blown-up aureate morning glories. Tom Wolfe I think every living moment of a human being's life, unless the person is starving or in immediate danger of death in some other way, is controlled by a concern for status. Tom Wolfe top-news There is no spectacle on earth more appealing than that of a beautiful woman in the act of cooking dinner for someone she loves. Tom Wolfe beautiful-woman woman earth beautiful Once you have speech, you don't have to wait for natural selection! If you want more strength, you build a stealth bomber; if you don't like bacteria, you invent penicillin; if you want to communicate faster, you invent the Internet. Once speech evolved, all of human life changed. Tom Wolfe you internet strength life I had always looked down on sociology as this arriviste discipline. It didn't have the noble history of English and history as a subject. But once I had a little exposure to it, I said, 'Hey, here's the key. Here's the key to understanding life and all its forms.' Tom Wolfe down discipline life history To me, the great joy of writing is discovering. Most writers are told to write about what they know, but I still love the adventure of going out and reporting on things I don't know about. Tom Wolfe great me adventure love By the 1950s The Novel had become a nationwide tournament. There was a magical assumption that the end of World War II in 1945 was the dawn of a new golden age of the American Novel, like the Hemingway-Dos Passos-Fitzgerald era after World War I. Tom Wolfe end age war world We are now in the Me Decade - seeing the upward roll of the third great religious wave in American history. Tom Wolfe decade great me history I found a great many pieces of punctuation and typography lying around dormant when I came along - and I must say I had a good time using them. Tom Wolfe say great good time I used to enjoy using dots where they would be least expected, not at the end of a sentence but in the middle, creating the effect... of a skipped beat. It seemed to me the mind reacted - first!... in dots, dashes, and exclamation points, then rationalized, drew up a brief, with periods. Tom Wolfe end me enjoy mind American government is like a train on a track. You have the people on the left shouting; you have the people on the right. But the train's on track. They just keep ploughing ahead. Tom Wolfe ahead you government people There is no motivation higher than being a good writer. Tom Wolfe being good higher motivation Everyone is taught the essentials of writing for at least 13 years, maybe more if they go to college. Nobody is taught music or tap dancing that way. Tom Wolfe nobody music college way
