A Quote by Whittaker Chambers

Tragedy occurs when a human soul awakes and seeks, in suffering and pain, to free itself from crime, violence, infamy, even at the cost of life. The struggle is the tragedy - not defeat or death.

Whittaker Chambers

Quote Topics

Cost Crime Death Defeat Even Free Human Human Soul Infamy Itself Life Occurs Pain Seeks Soul Struggle Suffering Suffering And Pain Tragedy Violence

Quote Author

Whittaker Chambers
American - Writer
April 1, 1901 - July 9, 1961

Crime, violence, infamy are not tragedy. Tragedy occurs when a human soul awakes and seeks, in suffering and pain, to free itself from crime, violence, infamy, even at the cost of life. The struggle is the tragedy - not defeat or death. That is why the spectacle of tragedy has always filled men, not with despair, but with a sense of hope and exaltation.

Whittaker Chambers

What is a defeat? It is just a good opportunity to make a new start, nothing else! Defeat is by no means a tragedy, but to consider it as a tragedy is in fact the greatest tragedy! In your every defeat, you must know that the paths of the victory never disappear; try those roads again!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

Human comedy is more profound than tragedy. In tragedy we die and it is very sad. In comedy we avoid death, and it is even sadder.

Jennifer Stone

Death is not the greatest tragedy in life. The greatest tragedy is what dies inside us while we live. We need not fear death. We need fear only that we may exist without having sensed something of the possibilities that lie within human existence.

Norman Cousins

Tragedy massages the human ego even as comedy deflates it. ... Tragedy pits us against large foes and the trip wire is our own character. ... In comedy we fall afoul of one another. Comedy depends on social life, on our behavior in groups. In tragedy you can observe one human against the gods. In comedy it's one human versus other humans and often one man (or woman if I'm writing it) against her own worst impulses.

Rita Mae Brown

Death is not a tragedy to the one who dies; to have wasted the life before that death, that is the tragedy.

Orson Scott Card

My hope and my intention was that people would experience the tragedy of what Chernobyl was in every regard: a scientific tragedy, a political tragedy, an emotional and personal tragedy, all of that.

Craig Mazin

What I'm interested in is happiness with a full awareness of the tragedy of life, the potential tragedy that lurks around every corner and the tragedy that actually is life.

Wolfgang Tillmans

We simply prefer to deny death or tragedy at all costs and, with it, a fundamental aspect of life. We do this instead of acknowledging that suffering represents one of the strongest incentives of life, which is the base of human solidarity and what brings intensity to happiness.

Claudia Llosa

How can we help students to understand that the tragedy of life is not death; the tragedy is to die with commitments undefined and convictions undeclared and service unfulfilled?

Vachel Lindsay

Clearly, the oil spill in the Gulf is a terrible tragedy; we lost 11 lives on the rig, and their families are suffering, and it's also an economic tragedy for our state and ecological tragedy for the Gulf. But Sept. 11 was a different type of event: it was an intentional attack on soil.

Charles Boustany

I wish i could tell you that through the tragedy i mined some undiscovered, life-altering absolute that i could pass on to you.I didn't.The cliches apply-people are what count,life is precious,materialism is over rated, and the little things matter,live in the moment-and i can repeat them to you ad nauseam.you might listen, but you won't internalize.Tragedy hammers it hm.Tragedy etches into your soul.You might not be happier.But you will be better.

Harlan Coben

What then is tragedy? In the Elizabethan period it was assumed that a play ending in death was a tragedy, but in recent years we have come to understand that to live on is sometimes far more tragic than death.

George Pierce Baker

The greatest tragedy in life is not death; the greatest tragedy takes place when our talents and capabilities are underutilized and allowed to rust while we are living.