1,579 Quotes by Kurt Vonnegut

The German philosopher Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, who had syphilis, said that only a person of deep faith could afford the luxury of religious skepticism. Humanists, by and large educated, comfortably middle-class persons with rewarding lives like mine, find rapture enough in secular knowledge and hope. Most people can't.

Speaking of plunging into war, do you know why I think George W. Bush is so pissed off at Arabs? They brought us algebra. Also the numbers we use, including a symbol for nothing, which Europeans had never had before. You think Arabs are dumb? Try doing long division with Roman numerals.

Live by the foma* that make you brave and kind and healthy and happy. *Harmless untruths

Nobody can work with the poor and not fall over Karl Marx from time to time — or just fall over the Bible, as far as that goes.

The lieutenant-colonel realized for the first time what most people never realize about themselves--that he was not only a victim of outrageous fortune, but one of outrageous fortune's cruelest agents as well.

I am not writing this book for people below the age of 18, but I see no harm in telling young people to prepare for failure rather than success, since failure is the main thing that is going to happen to them.

I had hoped, as a broadcaster, to be merely ludicrous, but this is a hard world to be ludicrous in, with so many human beings so reluctant to laugh, so incapable of thought, so eager to believe and snarl and hate. So many people wanted to believe me!Say what you will about the sweet miracle of unquestioning faith, I consider a capacity for it terrifying and absolutely vile.

This one is a failure, and had to be, since it was written by a pillar of salt.

Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind.