Quotes by Thornton Wilder

About Thornton Wilder:

Thornton Niven Wilder was an American playwright and novelist. He won three Pulitzer Prizes—for the novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and for the two plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth—and a U.S. National Book Award for the novel The Eighth Day.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Yes, now you know. Now you know! That's what it was to be alive. To move about in a cloud of ignorance; to go up and down trampling on the feelings of those...of those about you. To spend and waste time as though you had a million years. To be always...

Thornton Wilder

People are meant to go through life two by two. ’Tain’t natural to be lonesome.

Thornton Wilder

Only it seems to me that once in your life before you die you ought to see a country where they don't talk in English and don't even want to.

Thornton Wilder

Good-by, Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover's Corners... Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking... and Mama's sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths...and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you're too wonderful for anybo...

Thornton Wilder

The best thing about animals is that they don't talk much.

Thornton Wilder

When God loves a creature he wants the creature to know the highest happiness and the deepest misery He wants him to know all that being alive can bring. That is his best gift. There is no happiness save in understanding the whole.

Thornton Wilder

An incinerator is a writer's best friend.

Thornton Wilder

It is very necessary to have markers of beauty left in a world seemingly bent on making the most evil ugliness.

Thornton Wilder

Hope, like faith, is nothing if it is not courageous; it is nothing if it is not ridiculous.

Thornton Wilder

Pride, avarice, and envy are in every home.

Thornton Wilder

When you're safe at home you wish you were having an adventure; when you're having an adventure you wish you were safe at home.

Thornton Wilder

We do not choose the day of our birth nor may we choose the day of our death, yet choice is the sovereign faculty of the mind.

Thornton Wilder

Seek the lofty by reading, hearing and seeing great work at some moment every day.

Thornton Wilder

Ninety-nine percent of the people in the world are fools and the rest of us are in great danger of contagion.

Thornton Wilder

Every good thing in the world stands on the razor-edge of danger.

Thornton Wilder

I know that every good and excellent thing in the world stands moment by moment on the razor-edge of danger and must be fought for.

Thornton Wilder

Providence has nothing good or high in store for one who does not resolutely aim at something high or good. A purpose is the eternal condition of success.

Thornton Wilder

The future author is one who discovers that language, the exploration and manipulation of the resources of language, will serve him in winning through to his way.

Thornton Wilder

It is only in appearance that time is a river. It is rather a vast landscape and it is the eye of the beholder that moves.

Thornton Wilder

Nature reserves the right to inflict upon her children the most terrifying jests.

Thornton Wilder

Love is an energy which exists of itself. It is its own value.

Thornton Wilder

Author Bio

  • NameThornton Wilder
  • DescriptionAmerican playwright and novelist
  • AliasesThornton Niven Wilder
  • BornApril 17, 1897
  • DiedDecember 7, 1975
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionPlaywright; Novelist; Writer
  • AwardsOrder Of Merit For Arts And Science; Pulitzer Prize For Drama; National Book Award; Peace Prize Of The German Book Trade