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'Tis e'er the wont of simple folk to prize the deed and o'erlook the motive, and of learned folk to discount the deed and lay open the soul of the doer.

— John Barth The Sot-Weed Factor (1960)

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More quotes by John Barth

'Tis e'er the lot of the innocent in the world to fly to the wolf for succor from the lion.

The Sot-Weed Factor (1960)

When a place is central to a good writer's imagination, it is because that place has become a metaphor for larger concerns.

introductory note (1984)

Is a man a salvage at heart, skinned o'er with fragile manners? Or is salvagery but a faint taint in the natural man's gentility, which erupts now and again like pimples on an angel's arse?

The Sot-Weed Factor (1960)

I have remarked elsewhere that I regard the Almighty as not a bad novelist, except that He is a realist.

The Friday Book (1984)

We tell stories and listen to them because we live stories and live in them.

The Friday Book (1984)

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: John Barth (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.