Sarah Vowell Quotes
"History is full of really good stories. That's the main reason I got into this racket: I want to make the argument that history is interesting."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: History, Argument, Reason, Want)
"I didn't come from any kind of academic background, but I lived in a college town and I knew people who weren't without pretense. There was this idea in the town that if something was European it would be good."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: People, Idea, College)
"I discovered that Robert Todd Lincoln was there for each of the first three assassinations. I wanted to write about the Lincoln Memorial, so when I found out he had attended its dedication, that helped focus it further."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Dedication, First, Focus)
"I get younger people who watch Conan or The Daily Show, but before that it was mostly people who knew me from public radio. Those people are kind of old."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: People, Old, Public)
"I hated the lost colony; in second grade, we were doing American History, and they said, We don't know what happened to them. That drove me nuts. That lost colony drove me crazy."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: History, American)
"I loved that these two guys argued with each other as if movies actually mattered. Nobody I knew talked about movies that way, but Siskel and Ebert took each movie as it came and talked about whether it was a success on its own terms."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Movies, Success)
"I seem to have no problem revealing my crush on the man who murdered Lincoln."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Man)
"I was a big Nancy Drew reader. Nancy figures it out. Case closed."
- Sarah Vowell
"While I gave up God a long time ago, I never shook the habit of wanting to believe in something. So I replaced my creed of everlasting life with life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Happiness, Life, Time, God, Habit, Liberty, Pursuit)
"Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves, Robert Lincoln bought a nice ski lodge."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Ski)
"We go in to liberate Cuba, but Cuba still isn't free; we don't really think through what we'll do after the initial treaty is signed, but we're still occupying. There's chaos and torture and finally an outcry."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Chaos)
"Assassins and presidents invite the same basic question: Just who do you think you are?"
- Sarah Vowell
"The one time I was an actor, it happened to be in a globally dominant juggernaut. That was lucky."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Time, Actor)
"The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Civil War-when I really think about them they all seem about as likely as the parting of the Red Sea."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: War, Constitution, Independence, Parting, Sea)
"Relics are treasured as something close to the divine."
- Sarah Vowell
"Part of the success of This American Life, I think, is due to the fact that none of us sound like we should be on the radio. We don't sound professional; we sound like people you would know."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Success, Life, People, American, Fact, Sound)
"One night last summer, all the killers in my head assembled on a stage in Massachusetts to sing show tunes."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Night, Summer)
"Not that I want the current president killed. I will, for the record and for the FBI agent assigned to read this and make sure I mean no harm, clearly state that while I am obsessed with death, I am against it."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Death, Harm, President, State, Want, Will)
"My audience is going to die before I do."
- Sarah Vowell
"Most people don't like to talk about violent historical death."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Death, People, Talk)
"Like Lincoln, I would like to believe the ballot is stronger than the bullet. Then again, he said that before he got shot."
- Sarah Vowell
"Jesus and Lincoln, Moses and Jefferson can seem so long gone, so unbelievable, so dead."
- Sarah Vowell
"In death, you get upgraded into a saint no matter how much people hated you in life."
- Sarah Vowell
(Related: Life, Death, People)
"What are you hiding? No one ever asks that."
- Sarah Vowell
"I'm a big fan of editing and keeping only the interesting bits in."
- Sarah Vowell