Studs Terkel Quotes

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Studs Terkel

Profession : Journalist

Birth : May 16, 1912

If solace is any sort of succor to someone, that is sufficient. I believe in the faith of people, whatever faith they may have.

Studs Terkel

People are ready to say, 'Yes, we are ready for single-payer health insurance.' We are the only industrialized country in the world that does not have national health insurance. We are the richest in wealth and the poorest in health of all the industrial nations.

Studs Terkel

Someone who does an act. In a democratic society, you're supposed to be an activist; that is, you participate. It could be a letter written to an editor.

Studs Terkel

I'm not up on the Internet, but I hear that is a democratic possibility. People can connect with each other. I think people are ready for something, but there is no leadership to offer it to them. People are ready to say, 'Yes, we are part of a world.'

Studs Terkel

With optimism, you look upon the sunny side of things. People say, 'Studs, you're an optimist.' I never said I was an optimist. I have hope because what's the alternative to hope? Despair? If you have despair, you might as well put your head in the oven.

Studs Terkel

You happen to be talking to an agnostic. You know what an agnostic is? A cowardly atheist.

Studs Terkel

But once you become active in something, something happens to you. You get excited and suddenly you realize you count.

Studs Terkel

I want to praise activists through the years. I praise those of the past as well, to have them honored.

Studs Terkel

I want people to talk to one another no matter what their difference of opinion might be.

Studs Terkel

Why are we born? We're born eventually to die, of course. But what happens between the time we're born and we die? We're born to live. One is a realist if one hopes.

Studs Terkel

When you become part of something, in some way you count. It could be a march; it could be a rally, even a brief one. You're part of something, and you suddenly realize you count. To count is very important.

Studs Terkel

That's what we're missing. We're missing argument. We're missing debate. We're missing colloquy. We're missing all sorts of things. Instead, we're accepting.

Studs Terkel

I want, of course, peace, grace, and beauty. How do you do that? You work for it.

Studs Terkel

I want a language that speaks the truth.

Studs Terkel

I always love to quote Albert Einstein because nobody dares contradict him.

Studs Terkel

I think it's realistic to have hope. One can be a perverse idealist and say the easiest thing: 'I despair. The world's no good.' That's a perverse idealist. It's practical to hope, because the hope is for us to survive as a human species. That's very realistic.

Studs Terkel

Religion obviously played a role in this book and the previous book, too.

Studs Terkel

We are the most powerful nation in the world, but we're not the only nation in the world. We are not the only people in the world. We are an important people, the wealthiest, the most powerful and, to a great extent, generous. But we are part of the world.

Studs Terkel

I've always felt, in all my books, that there's a deep decency in the American people and a native intelligence - providing they have the facts, providing they have the information.

Studs Terkel

Chicago is not the most corrupt American city. It's the most theatrically corrupt.

Studs Terkel