911 Quotes by Tom Robbins

When I was younger, before this layoff which has nearly finished me, I hitchhiked one hundred and twenty-seven hours without stopping, without food or sleep, crossed the continent twice in six days, cooled my thumbs in both oceans and caught rides after midnight on unlighted highways, such was my skill, persuasion, rhythm. I set records and immediately cracked them; went farther, faster than any hitchhiker before or since.

The most useful thing about art is it’s uselessness.

The kingdom of formal ideas will always be a weak neighbor to the kingdom of thrills.

People tend to take everything too seriously. Especially themselves.

We’re our own dragons as well as our own heroes, and we have to rescue ourselves from ourselves.

Summer had come to sit on New York’s face.

Jackson Pollock said once, “I don’t really feel that many people in this world are alive.” He said, “That’s why I like you, Tom. You’re alive.”

The pain of love does not break hearts, it merely seasons them. The disappointed heart revives itself and grows meaty and piquant. Sorrow expands it and makes it pithy. The spirit, on the other hand, can snap like a bone and may never fully knit.

John Irving once told me he doesn’t start a novel until he knows the last sentence. I said, ‘My God, Irving, isn’t that like working in a factory?’