160 Quotes by Daniel J. Boorstin

The hero was distinguished by his achievement; the celebrity by his name or trademark.

American civilization, from its beginnings, had combined a dogmatic confidence in the future with a naive puzzlement over what the future might bring.

The mind is a vagrant thing.... Thinking is not analogous to a person working in a laboratory who invents something on company time.

It is very unlikely that the computer will displace the books, except in areas where we need information speedily.

The hero created himself; the celebrity is created by the media.

The hero was a big man; the celebrity is a big name.

Jeffersonian isolationism expressed an essentially cosmopolitan spirit. The Jeffersonian was determined - even at the expense of separating himself from the rest of the globe, and even though he be charged with provincial selfishness - to preserve America as an uncontaminated laboratory.

Jefferson refused to pin his hopes on the occasional success of honest and unambitious men; on the contrary, the great danger was that philosophers would be lulled into complacence by the accidental rise of a Franklin or a Washington. Any government which made the welfare of men depend on the character of their governors was an illusion.

In the small town each citizen had done something in his own way to build the community. The town booster had a vision of the future which he tried to fulfill. The suburb dweller by contrast started with the future