Top 160 James Thurber Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Walter Mitty: To see the world, things dangerous to come to, to see behind walls, draw closer, to find each other, and to feel. That is the purpose of life.”

— James Thurber

2. “Beautiful things don’t ask for attention.”

— James Thurber

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3. “Don’t get it right, just get it written.”

— James Thurber

4. “Let us not look back in anger, nor forward in fear, but around in awareness.”

— James Thurber

5. “It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers.”

— James Thurber

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6. “All men should strive to learn before they die, what they are running from, and to, and why.”

— James Thurber

7. “There is no exception to the rule that every rule has an exception.”

— James Thurber

8. “Two is company, four is a party, three is a crowd. One is a wanderer.”

— James Thurber

9. “There are two kinds of light – the glow that illuminates, and the glare that obscures.”

— James Thurber

10. “Americans want to go to heaven without dying.”

— James Thurber

11. “Humor and pathos, tears and laughter are, in the highest expression of human character and achievement, inseparable.”

— James Thurber

12. “It takes that je ne sais quoi which we call sophistication for a woman to be magnificent in a drawing-room when her faculties have departed but she herself has not yet gone home.”

— James Thurber

13. “The act of writing is either something the writer dreads or actually likes, and I actually like it. Even re-writing’s fun. You’re getting somewhere, whether it seems to move or not.”

— James Thurber

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14. “A false or misunderstood word may create as much disaster as a sudden thoughtless act.”

— James Thurber

15. “Human Dignity has gleamed only now and then and here and there, in lonely splendor, throughout the ages, a hope of the better men, never an achievement of the majority.”

— James Thurber

16. “Love is what you’ve been through with somebody.”

— James Thurber

17. “One martini is all right. Two are too many, and three are not enough.”

— James Thurber

18. “If you wonder which is the stronger sex, watch which one twists the other around her little finger.”

— James Thurber

19. “Man has gone long enough, or even too long, without being man enough to face the simple truth that the trouble with man is man.”

— James Thurber

20. “Well, if I called the wrong number, why did you answer the phone?”

— James Thurber

21. “Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility.”

— James Thurber

22. “Dogs are obsessed with being happy.”

— James Thurber

23. “History is replete with proofs, from Cato the Elder to Kennedy the Younger, that if you scratch a statesman you find an actor, but it is becoming harder and harder, in our time, to tell government from show business.”

— James Thurber

24. “Why do you have to be a nonconformist like everybody else?”

— James Thurber

25. “A husband should not insult his wife publicly, at parties. He should insult her in the privacy of the home.”

— James Thurber

26. “Lately, I have been wondering if there is time left for daydreaming in this 21st-century world of constant communication.”

— James Thurber

27. “Quick, name some towns in New Jersey.”

— James Thurber

28. “He who hesitates is sometimes saved.”

— James Thurber

29. “Mutual suspicions of mental inadequacy are common during the first year of any marriage.”

— James Thurber

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30. “Let us not look back to the past with anger, nor towards the future with fear, but look around with awareness.”

— James Thurber

31. “You might as well fall flat on your face as lean over too far backward.”

— James Thurber

32. “Women are wiser than men because they know less and understand more.”

— James Thurber

33. “The dog has got more fun out of Man than Man has got out of the dog, for the clearly demonstrable reason that Man is the more laughable of the two animals.”

— James Thurber

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34. “Looks can be deceiving; it’s eating that’s believing.”

— James Thurber

35. “A woman’s place is in the wrong.”

— James Thurber

36. “Don’t count your boobies until they are hatched.”

— James Thurber

37. “Live life by the abc’s... adventure, bravery and creativity.”

— James Thurber

38. “I could have killed Gregory Fitzhurst at three hundred feet with my left hand.”

— James Thurber

39. “If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons.”

— James Thurber

40. “The pounding of the cylinders increased: ta-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa.”

— James Thurber

41. “Somebody has said that woman’s place is in the wrong. That’s fine. What the wrong needs is a woman’s presence and a woman’s touch. She is far better equipped than men to set it right.”

— James Thurber

42. “I myself have known some profoundly thoughtful dogs.”

— James Thurber

43. “The Old Man ain’t afraid of hell.”

— James Thurber

44. “A drawing is always dragged down to the level of its caption.”

— James Thurber

45. “The trouble with the lost generation is that it didn’t get lost enough.”

— James Thurber

46. “I am not a cat man, but a dog man, and all felines can tell this at a glance – a sharp, vindictive glance.”

— James Thurber

47. “The paths of glory at least lead to the Grave, but the paths of duty may not get you Anywhere.”

— James Thurber

48. “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread, and the angels are all in Heaven, but few of the fools are dead.”

— James Thurber

49. “Boys are beyond the range of anybody’s sure understanding, at least when they are between the ages of 18 months and 90 years.”

— James Thurber

50. “I do not have a psychiatrist and I do not want one, for the simple reason that if he listened to me long enough, he might become disturbed.”

— James Thurber