{"author":"Tom Robbins","author_id":"Tom+Robbins","total_quotes":180,"quotes":[{"text":"Suppose neutral angels were able to talk, Yahweh and Lucifer – God and Satan, to use their popular titles – into settling out of court. What would be the terms of the compromise? Specifically, how would they divide the assets of their early kingdom?Would God be satisfied the loaves and fishes and itty-bitty thimbles of Communion wine, while Satan to have the red-eye gravy, eighteen-ounce New York Stakes, and buckets of chilled champagne? Would God really accept twice-a-month lovemaking for procreative purposes and give Satan the all night, no-holds-barred, nasty “can’t-get-enough-of-you” hot-as-hell-fucks?Think about it. Would Satan get New Orleans, Bangkok, and the French Riviera and God get Salt Lake City? Satan get ice hockey, God get horseshoes? God get bingo, Satan get stud poker? Satan get LSD; God, Prozac? God get Neil Simon; Satan Oscar Wilde?","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["god","satan"],"id":3094,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"For the ethical, political activism was seductive because it seemed to offer the possibility that one could improve society, make things better, without going through the personal ordeal of rearranging one's perceptions and transforming one's self. For the unconscionable, political reactivism was seductive because it seemed to protect one's holdings and legitimize one's greed. But both sides were gazing through a kerchief of illusion.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["transformation"],"id":9416,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"I believe in political solutions to political problems. But man's primary problems aren't political; they're philosophical. Until humans can solve their philosophical problems, they're condemned to solve their political problems over and over and over again. It's a cruel, repetitious bore.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["philosophy","politics","problems","solutions"],"id":14006,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"When two people meet and fall in love, there's a sudden rush of magic. Magic is just naturally present then. We tend to feed on that gratuitous magic without striving to make any more. One day we wake up and find that the magic is gone. We hustle to get it back, but by then it's usually too late, we've used it up. What we have to do is work like hell at making additional magic right from the start. It's hard work, but if we can remember to do it, we greatly improve our chances of making love stay.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["love","magic"],"id":21097,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"Boomer had asked her once, in a telephone call from Virginia, “Why does this stuff, these hand-painted hallucinations that don’t do nothin’ but confuse the puddin’ out of a perfectly reasonable wall, why does it mean so much to you?” It was a poor connection, but he could have sworn he heard her say, “In the haunted house of life, art is the only stair that doesn’t creak.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["art","painting"],"id":23254,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"There's no point in saving the world if it means losing the moon.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["logic","moon"],"id":27456,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"When humans were young, they were pushed around in strollers. When they were old, they were pushed around in wheelchairs. In between, they were just pushed around.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["age","humans","life"],"id":28751,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"The minute you land in New Orleans, something wet and dark leaps on you and starts humping you like a swamp dog in heat, and the only way to get that aspect of New Orleans off you is to eat it off. That means beignets and crayfish bisque and jambalaya, it means shrimp remoulade, pecan pie, and red beans with rice, it means elegant pompano au papillote, funky file z'herbes, and raw oysters by the dozen, it means grillades for breakfast, a po' boy with chowchow at bedtime, and tubs of gumbo in between. It is not unusual for a visitor to the city to gain fifteen pounds in a week--yet the alternative is a whole lot worse. If you don't eat day and night, if you don't constantly funnel the indigenous flavors into your bloodstream, then the mystery beast will go right on humping you, and you will feel its sordid presence rubbing against you long after you have left town. In fact, like any sex offender, it can leave permanent psychological scars.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["beignets","crayfish","food","gumbo","jambalaya","new-orleans","pecan-pie","po-boys","red-beans-with-rice"],"id":29729,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"Perhaps the most terrible (or wonderful) thing that can happen to an imaginative youth, aside from the curse (or blessing) of imagination itself, is to be exposed without preparation to the life outside his or her own sphere - the sudden revelation that there is a there out there.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["existence","life","thought-provoking"],"id":35368,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"},{"text":"Albert Camus wrote that the only serious question is whether to kill yourself or not.Tom Robbins wrote that the only serious question is whether time has a beginning and an end.Camus clearly got up on the wrong side of bed, and Robbins must have forgotten to set the alarm.There is only one serious question. And that is: Who knows how to make love stay?Answer me that and I will tell you whether or not to kill yourself.","author":"Tom Robbins","tags":["love","questions"],"id":37100,"author_id":"Tom+Robbins"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":180,"pages":18,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}