Words matter. These are the best Studs Terkel Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Religion obviously played a role in this book and the previous book, too.
You happen to be talking to an agnostic. You know what an agnostic is? A cowardly atheist.
I always love to quote Albert Einstein because nobody dares contradict him.
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.
I want people to talk to one another no matter what their difference of opinion might be.
That’s why I wrote this book: to show how these people can imbue us with hope. I read somewhere that when a person takes part in community action, his health improves. Something happens to him or to her biologically. It’s like a tonic.
I want to praise activists through the years. I praise those of the past as well, to have them honored.
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.
I hope for peace and sanity – it’s the same thing.
All the other books ask, ‘What’s it like?’ What was World War II like for the young kid at Normandy, or what is work like for a woman having a job for the first time in her life? What’s it like to be black or white?
Chicago is not the most corrupt American city. It’s the most theatrically corrupt.
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.
So people are ready. I feel hopeful in that sense.
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.
I want a language that speaks the truth.
I thought, if ever there were a time to write a book about hope, it’s now.
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.
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.’
Nonetheless, do I have respect for people who believe in the hereafter? Of course I do. I might add, perhaps even a touch of envy too, because of the solace.
