Tom Wolfe Quotes

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Tom Wolfe

Profession : Journalist

Birth : March 2, 1931

I have discovered that for me - now, maybe it doesn't work for everybody - for me, it is much more effective to arrive at any situation as a man from Mars than to try to fit in.

Tom Wolfe

I was sitting in my office when someone called to tell me two light planes had collided with the World Trade Centre. I turned on my television; before long, there was this procession of people of all kinds walking up the street. What I remember most was the silence of that crowd; there was no sound.

Tom Wolfe

American government is like a train on a track. You have the people on the left shouting; you have the people on the right. But the train's on track. They just keep ploughing ahead.

Tom Wolfe

So many people in this country have a dual loyalty. They have loyalty to America, but they also are determined to have their parade up Fifth Avenue once a year... a Cuban parade or a Puerto Rican parade - many other countries. So they really don't forget.

Tom Wolfe

I'm a great believer in outlines.

Tom Wolfe

Nonfiction is never going to die.

Tom Wolfe

My entire career, in fiction or nonfiction, I have reported and written about people who are not like me.

Tom Wolfe

The newspaper is, in fact, very bad for one's prose style. That's why I gravitated towards feature stories where you get a little more leeway in the writing style.

Tom Wolfe

There was a time in the 1930s when magazine writers could actually make a good living. 'The Saturday Evening Post' and 'Collier's' both had three stories in each issue. These were usually entertaining, and people really went for them. But then television came along, and now of course, information technology... the new way of killing time.

Tom Wolfe

There are some people who have the quality of richness and joy in them and they communicate it to everything they touch. It is first of all a physical quality; then it is a quality of the spirit.

Tom Wolfe

Philip Roth is a fabulous writer, but he pretty much stays within his own life. He's so good - I mean, practically anything I've ever read of his I've really enjoyed. He just has tremendous talent. But I think he should have given himself a break and gone deeper into the society.

Tom Wolfe

I can remember that on the shelves at home, there were these books by Thomas Wolfe. 'Look Homeward Angel' and 'Of Time and the River.' 'Of Time and the River' had just come out when I was aware of his name. My parents had a hard time convincing me that he was no kin whatsoever. My attitude was, 'Well, what's he doing on the shelf, then?'

Tom Wolfe

That's mostly what the Internet is, just passing the time. But unfortunately you are dealing with words that can have meaning.

Tom Wolfe

I have no idea who coined the term 'the New Journalism,' or when it was coined. I have never even liked the term. Any movement, group, party, program, philosophy or theory that goes under a name with 'new' in it is just begging for trouble, of course.

Tom Wolfe

Even hostile parodies admit from the start that the target has a distinct voice.

Tom Wolfe

Not long after I published my first book, I quickly found I was terrible at being interviewed.

Tom Wolfe

To me, the great joy of writing is discovering. Most writers are told to write about what they know, but I still love the adventure of going out and reporting on things I don't know about.

Tom Wolfe

'No Hands' art goes straight back to Warhol. He was the first to use elves.

Tom Wolfe

We are always acting on what has just finished happening. It happened at least 1/30th of a second ago. We think we're in the present, but we aren't. The present we know is only a movie of the past.

Tom Wolfe

It is very comforting to believe that leaders who do terrible things are, in fact, mad. That way, all we have to do is make sure we don't put psychotics in high places and we've got the problem solved.

Tom Wolfe