A Quote by Kurt Vonnegut

I've got news for Mr. Santayana: we're doomed to repeat the past no matter what. That's what it is to be alive.

Kurt Vonnegut

Quote Topics

Alive Doomed Got Matter News No Matter What Past Repeat

Quote Author

Kurt Vonnegut
American - Writer
November 11, 1922 - April 11, 2007

We're doomed to repeat the past no matter what. That's what it is to be alive. It's pretty dense kids who haven't figured that out by the time they're ten.... Most kids can't afford to go to Harvard and be misinformed.

Kurt Vonnegut

Santayana's aphorism must be reversed: too often it is those who can remember the past who are condemned to repeat it.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

No statement is more true and better applicable to Wall Street than the famous warning of Santayana: "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it".

Benjamin Graham

He who forgets the past is doomed to repeat it.

Paul Christopher

Those who don't remember the past are doomed to repeat it.

Sara Shepard

Those unable to catalog the past are doomed to repeat it.

Daniel Handler

I felt him there with me. The real David. My David. David, you are still here. Alive. Alive in me.Alive in the galaxy.Alive in the stars.Alive in the sky.Alive in the sea.Alive in the palm trees.Alive in feathers.Alive in birds.Alive in the mountains.Alive in the coyotes.Alive in books.Alive in sound.Alive in mom.Alive in dad.Alive in Bobby.Alive in me.Alive in soil.Alive in branches.Alive in fossils.Alive in tongues.Alive in eyes.Alive in cries.Alive in bodies.Alive in past, present and future. Alive forever.

Kelly Easton

This is what I say: I've got good news and bad news. The good news is, you don't have to worry, you can't change the past. The bad news is, you don't have to worry, no matter how hard you try, you can't change the past. The universe just doesn't put up with that. We aren't important enough. No one is. Even in our own lives. We're not strong enough, willful enough, skilled enough in chronodiegetic manipulation to be able to just accidentally change the entire course of anything, even ourselves.

Charles Yu

Thus through half-belief, we are often doomed to repeat that very past we should have learned from.

Ray Bradbury

It's been my experience, Langford, that the past always has a way of returning. Those who don't learn, or can't remember it, are doomed to repeat it.

Steve Berry

Mmm....she's doomed! You're doomed!! They're all doomed! Notice I didn't specify what kind of doom, so no matter what happens, I predicted it. How very WISE of me.

Christopher Paolini

Many pundits today are in the habit of misquoting Santayana's epigram, Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. Maybe some people have come to grief this way, but they are probably fewer than those who have fallen into the opposite error. One is apt to perish in politics from too much memory, Tocqueville wrote somewhere, with equal truth and greater insight.

David Hackett Fischer

Got good news and bad news for you, Mr. President. The good news is that Chief Justice John Roberts just saved your legacy and, perhaps, your presidency by writing for the Supreme Court majority to rule health care reform constitutional.