Zitate von William Saroyan
William Saroyan
Geburtstag: 31. August 1908
Todesdatum: 18. Mai 1981
William Saroyan war ein US-amerikanischer Schriftsteller armenischer Herkunft.
Zitate William Saroyan
„One day, back there in the good old days when I was nine and the world was full of every kind of magnificence, and life was still a delightful and mysterious dream, my cousin Mourad, who was considered crazy by everybody who knew him except me, came to my house at four in the morning and woke me up by tapping on the window of my room.“
— William Saroyan, buch My Name Is Aram
"The Summer of the Beautiful White Horse".
My Name Is Aram (1940)
Kontext: One day, back there in the good old days when I was nine and the world was full of every kind of magnificence, and life was still a delightful and mysterious dream, my cousin Mourad, who was considered crazy by everybody who knew him except me, came to my house at four in the morning and woke me up by tapping on the window of my room.
"Aram," he said.
I jumped out of bed and looked out the window.
I couldn't believe what I saw.
It wasn't morning yet, but it was summer and with daybreak not many minutes around the corner of the world it was light enough for me to know I wasn't dreaming.
My cousin Mourad was sitting on a beautiful white horse.
„Then swiftly, neatly, with the grace of the young man on the trapeze, he was gone from his body.
For an eternal moment he was still all things at once: the bird, the fish, the rodent, the reptile, and man.“
"The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze"
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934)
Kontext: Then swiftly, neatly, with the grace of the young man on the trapeze, he was gone from his body.
For an eternal moment he was still all things at once: the bird, the fish, the rodent, the reptile, and man. An ocean of print undulated endlessly and darkly before him. The city burned. The herded crowd rioted. The earth circled away, and knowing that he did so, he turned his lost face to the empty sky and became dreamless, unalive, perfect.
„In the end, today is forever, yesterday is still today, and tomorrow is already today.“
My Heart's in the Highlands (1939)
„When you laugh, laugh like hell. And when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough.“
Preface
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934)
Kontext: The most solid advice for a writer is this, I think: Try to learn to breathe deeply, really to taste food when you eat, and when you sleep really to sleep. Try as much as possible to be wholly alive with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell. And when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough.
„I am interested in madness. I believe it is the biggest thing in the human race, and the most constant.“
Short Drive, Sweet Chariot (1966)
Kontext: I am interested in madness. I believe it is the biggest thing in the human race, and the most constant. How do you take away from a man his madness without also taking away his identity? Are we sure it is desirable for a man's spirit not to be at war with itself, or that it is better to be serene and ready to go to dinner than to be excited and unwilling to stop for a cup of coffee, even?
„Every man alive in the world is a beggar of one sort or another, every last one of them, great and small.“
"The Beggars" in The William Saroyan Reader (1958)
Kontext: Every man alive in the world is a beggar of one sort or another, every last one of them, great and small. The priest begs God for grace, and the king begs something for something. Sometimes he begs the people for loyalty, sometimes he begs God to forgive him. No man in the world can have endured ten years without having begged God to forgive him.
„A trapeze to God, or to nothing, a flying trapeze to some sort of eternity; he prayed objectively for strength to make the flight with grace.“
"The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze"
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934)
Kontext: Through the air on the flying trapeze, his mind hummed. Amusing it was, astoundingly funny. A trapeze to God, or to nothing, a flying trapeze to some sort of eternity; he prayed objectively for strength to make the flight with grace.
„If you can't write a decent short story because of the cold, write something else. Write anything.“
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934), A Cold Day
Kontext: If you can't write a decent short story because of the cold, write something else. Write anything. Write a long letter to somebody.
„There is no America and there is no England, and no France, and no Italy. There is only the earth.“
Inhale and Exhale (1936)
Kontext: There is a small area of land in Asia Minor that is called Armenia, but it is not so. It is not Armenia. It is a place. There are only Armenians, and they inhabit the earth, not Armenia, since there is no Armenia. There is no America and there is no England, and no France, and no Italy. There is only the earth.
„There is a small area of land in Asia Minor that is called Armenia, but it is not so.“
Inhale and Exhale (1936)
Kontext: There is a small area of land in Asia Minor that is called Armenia, but it is not so. It is not Armenia. It is a place. There are only Armenians, and they inhabit the earth, not Armenia, since there is no Armenia. There is no America and there is no England, and no France, and no Italy. There is only the earth.
„For if everybody else is also not what Jesus said he was, what good is what he said?“
Sons Come and Go, Mothers Hang in Forever (1976)
Kontext: Jesus never said anything about absurdity, and he never indicated for one flash of time that he was aware of the preposterousness of his theory about himself. And he didn't even try to make the theory understandable in terms of the reality and experience of the rest of us. For if everybody else is also not what Jesus said he was, what good is what he said?
„The loneliness does not come from the War. The War did not make it. It was the loneliness that made the War.“
— William Saroyan, buch The Human Comedy
The Human Comedy (1943)
Kontext: Everything is changed — for you. But it is still the same, too. The loneliness you feel has come to you because you are no longer a child. But the whole world has always been full of that loneliness. The loneliness does not come from the War. The War did not make it. It was the loneliness that made the War.
„He paints for the blind, and we are the blind, and he lets us see for sure what we saw long ago but weren't sure we saw.“
On painter Rufino Tamayo.
I Used to Believe I Had Forever — Now I'm Not So Sure (1968)
Kontext: He paints for the blind, and we are the blind, and he lets us see for sure what we saw long ago but weren't sure we saw. He paints for the dead, to remind us that — great good God, think of it — we're alive, and on our way to weather, from the sea to the hot interior, to watermelon there, a bird at night chasing a child past flowering cactus, a building on fire, barking dogs, and guitar-players not playing at eight o'clock, every picture saying, "Did you live, man? Were you alive back there for a little while? Good for you, good for you, and wasn't it hot, though? Wasn't it great when it was hot, though?"
„You act as if you know more than I'll ever know, but I've forgotten more than you'll ever know.“
Jim Dandy : Fat Man in a Famine (1947)
Kontext: You act as if you know more than I'll ever know, but I've forgotten more than you'll ever know. You're snobs, too. Every man I've ever met has been a snob. You don't have to be a snob, too, do you? Please sign this piece of paper, so I can be a member of the public library and read books and find out about people. I don't want to hate you, I just can't help it.
„I began to write in the first place because I expected everything to change, and I wanted to have things in writing the way they had been.“
"One Day in the Afternoon of the World" (1964)
Kontext: I began to write in the first place because I expected everything to change, and I wanted to have things in writing the way they had been. Just a little things, of course. A little of my little.
„The writer is a spiritual anarchist, as in the depth of his soul every man is.“
The William Saroyan Reader (1958)
Kontext: The writer is a spiritual anarchist, as in the depth of his soul every man is. He is discontented with everything and everybody. The writer is everybody's best friend and only true enemy — the good and great enemy. He neither walks with the multitude nor cheers with them. The writer who is a writer is a rebel who never stops.
„I believed from the beginning of remembered experience that I was somebody with an incalculable potential for enlargement, somebody who both knew and could find out, upon whom demands could be made with the expectation of having them fulfilled.
I felt at the same time, and pretty much constantly, that I was nothing in relation to Enormity, the Unknown, and the Unknowable.“
Here Comes There Goes You Know Who (1961)
Kontext: I believed from the beginning of remembered experience that I was somebody with an incalculable potential for enlargement, somebody who both knew and could find out, upon whom demands could be made with the expectation of having them fulfilled.
I felt at the same time, and pretty much constantly, that I was nothing in relation to Enormity, the Unknown, and the Unknowable. I was too vulnerable, too lacking in power, a thing of subtle reality, liable to be blown away without a moment's warning, a migrant with no meaning, no guide, no counsel, an entity in continuous transition, a growing thing whose stages of growth always went unnoticed, a fluid and flawed thing. Thus, there could be no extreme vanity in my recognition of myself, if in fact there could be any at all. I did frequently rejoice in the recognition, but I may have gotten that from some of the Protestant hymns I had heard, and knew, and had sung, such as Joy to the World. The simple fact was that if the song wasn't about me, I couldn't see how it could possibly be about anybody else, including the one I knew it was supposed to be about, and good luck to him, too.
