Leo Rosten
Leo Calvin Rosten (April 11, 1908February 19, 1997) was an American teacher, academic and humorist best remembered for his stories about the night-school "prodigy" Hyman Kaplan (first published in The New Yorker in the 1930s, and later reprinted in two volumesThe Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N and The Return of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N, under the pseudonym Leonard Q. Ross), and for The Joys of Yiddishan excellent guide to the language and to Jewish culture (as well as a great source for anecdotes and Jewish humour).
13 Quotes
We see things as we are, not as they are.
— Leo Rosten
I never cease being dumbfounded by the unbelievable things people believe.
— Leo Rosten
In the dark colony of night, when I consider man's magnificent capacity for malice, madness, folly, envy, rage, and destructiveness, and I wonder whether we shall not end up as breakfast for newts and polyps, I seem to hear the muffled cries of all the words in all the books with covers closed.
— Leo Rosten
Extremists think communication means agreeing with them.
— Leo Rosten
Courage is the capacity to confirm what can be imagined.
— Leo Rosten
If you are going to do something wrong, at least enjoy it.
— Leo Rosten
Humor is the affectionate communication of insight.
— Leo Rosten
Humor is, I think, the sublets and chanciest of literary forms. It is surely not accidental that there are a thousand novelists, essayists, poets or journalists for each humorist. It is a long, long time between James Thurbers
— Leo Rosten
Satire is focused bitterness.
— Leo Rosten
Truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to make sense.
— Leo Rosten
A writer writes not because he is educated but because he is driven by the need to communicate. Behind the need to communicate is the need to share. Behind the need to share is the need to be understood. The writer wants to be understood much more than he wants to be respected or praised or even loved. And that perhaps, is what makes him different from others.
— Leo Rosten
Every writer is a narcissist. This does not mean that he is vain; it only means that he is hopelessly self-absorbed.
— Leo Rosten
The only reason for being a professional writer is that you can't help it.
— Leo Rosten