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

Many who have spent a lifetime in it can tell us less of love than the child that lost a dog yesterday.

Thornton Wilder

There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.

Thornton Wilder

I would love to be the poet laureate of Coney Island.

Thornton Wilder

Marriage is a bribe to make the housekeeper think she's a householder.

Thornton Wilder

The theatre is supremely fitted to say: 'Behold! These things are.' Yet most dramatists employ it to say: 'This moral truth can be learned from beholding this action.'

Thornton Wilder

My advice to you is not to inquire why or whither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it's on your plate.

Thornton Wilder

Those who are silent, self-effacing and attentive become the recipients of confidences.

Thornton Wilder

For what human ill does not dawn seem to be an alleviation?

Thornton Wilder

Many plays - certainly mine - are like blank checks. The actors and directors put their own signatures on them.

Thornton Wilder

If I wasn't an actor, I'd be a secret agent.

Thornton Wilder

In advertising, not to be different is virtual suicide.

Thornton Wilder

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.

Thornton Wilder

There's nothing like eavesdropping to show you that the world outside your head is different from the world inside your head.

Thornton Wilder

I am convinced that, except in a few extraordinary cases, one form or another of an unhappy childhood is essential to the formation of exceptional gifts.

Thornton Wilder

Literature is the orchestration of platitudes.

Thornton Wilder

Man is not an end but a beginning. We are at the beginning of the second week. We are children of the eighth day.

Thornton Wilder

A dramatist is one who believes that the pure event, an action involving human beings, is more arresting than any comment that can be made upon it.

Thornton Wilder

A play visibly represents pure existing.

Thornton Wilder

The highest tribute to the dead is not grief but gratitude.

Thornton Wilder

So - people a thousand years from now...This is the way we were: in our growing up and in our marrying and in our living and in our dying.

Thornton Wilder

Never support two weaknesses at the same time. It's your combination sinners - your lecherous liars and your miserly drunkards - who dishonor the vices and bring them into bad repute.

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