John Darnielle Quotes

Quotes about:

• Good things never last, bad things never die.

  John Darnielle

  Lasts, Good Things, Dies

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• Everybody experiences reality in a way that's only true for them.

  John Darnielle

  Reality, Way

  "The Mountain Goats". Interview with Larry Fitzmaurice, pitchfork.com. October 1, 2012.

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• Do every stupid thing that makes you feel alive.

  John Darnielle

  Stupid, Alive, Feels

  "Song: "Amy aka Spent Gladiator I" ("Transcendental Youth")". 2012.

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• I'm finding things out about myself as a person - as a writer - as I write, and so are the people who listen to what I do. But they have this additional aspect of how they take the stuff that I do, and so it broadens the work and it creates this strange connection. It's really a way of strangers communicating through this third thing, which is a body of work. But really, I know it's a cliché to say I write for myself, but I write for myself.

  John Darnielle

  Writing, People, Strange

  "What’s Got John Darnielle’s Goat?". Interview With Emma Silvers, www.motherjones.com. March 25, 2011.

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• One way you can get really close to God is to sin as hard as you can.

  John Darnielle

  Way, Sin, Get Real

  "John Darnielle Tells the Story Behind the Mountain Goats' Biblical New LP". Interview with Tom Breihan, pitchfork.com. September 8, 2009.

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• There are only two stories: either you go forward or you die.

  John Darnielle

  Two, Stories, Dies

  John Darnielle (2014). “Wolf in White Van: A Novel”, p.157, Macmillan

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• It's good to be young, but let's not kid ourselves/ It's better to pass on through those years and come out the other side/ With our hearts still beating/ Having stared down demons/ Come back breathing.

  John Darnielle

  Heart, Kids, Years

  "God bless youthful bastard bravery". Interview with Ben Kopel, logger.believermag.com. October 23, 2013.

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• When you punish a person for dreaming his dream, don't expect him to thank or forgive you.

  John Darnielle

  Dream, Forgiving, Persons

  "The Believer" Interview, www.believermag.com. July 2004.

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• It's impossible to be content all the time - you have to learn to be content in places where you're unhappy and owning your emotions, whatever they are.

  John Darnielle

  Unhappy, Impossible, Emotion

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• Life is hard, you're tired, and there's disease. The strategy that works for children is to be delighted by the things that delight you.

  John Darnielle

  Children, Tired, Life Is Hard

  "The Mountain Goats". Interview with Larry Fitzmaurice, pitchfork.com. October 1, 2012.

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• There's no such thing as mental illness. We're all mentally ill and we're all haunted by something, and some people manage to find a way to ride it out so that they don't wind up needing extra help. So I think that "mental illness," as a term, is garbage. Everybody is in various states of needing to transcend something.

  John Darnielle

  Thinking, Extra Help, Wind

  "The Mountain Goats". Interview with Larry Fitzmaurice, pitchfork.com. October 1, 2012.

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• You can get really good reads on your dreams if you think of every character in them as actually being you.

  John Darnielle

  Dream, Character, Thinking

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• Anything that is within you is a gift. To be able to take possession of that and say, "Whatever it is, I am bigger than it," is to learn to cherish even the hard and painful things.

  John Darnielle

  Able, Painful, Cherish

  "The Mountain Goats". Interview with Larry Fitzmaurice, pitchfork.com. October 1, 2012.

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• People talk about songwriting or comedy as creative expression, but life is creative expression. Table-making, even nursing, is extraordinarily creative.

  John Darnielle

  Nursing, Expression, People

  Source: www.interviewmagazine.com

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• Normal adult shopping is something I will never actually do, because it's no more possible for me to go shopping like normal adults do than it is for a man with no legs to wake up one day and walk. I can't miss shopping like you'd miss things you once had. I miss it in a different way. I miss it like you would miss a train.

  John Darnielle

  Men, Shopping, Missing

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• I have a hunger for justice, but art is a place I've always enjoyed being able to be free - to live in worlds that you don't have to be thinking about that all the time. I don't see myself writing Upton Sinclair books. My books are to entertain, although to me, entertainment is to make you feel sadness or to get in touch with your own pain - or fear, or to remember somebody who has gone missing from your life. That's my calling.

  John Darnielle

  Art, Pain, Book

  "Lyrical Genius John Darnielle Wrote a Scary New Novel". Interview With Alexander Sammon, www.motherjones.com. February 4, 2017.

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• I am at a place in my life where the more like a cave I can make my surroundings, the happier I am.

  John Darnielle

  Caves, Surroundings, I Can

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• You should avoid seeing too much of yourself anywhere: in the outside world, in others, in the imagined worlds that give you shelter.

  John Darnielle

  Giving, World, Shelter

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• I seem to get the best work when I'm angry and depressed and alienated.

  John Darnielle

  Best Work, Angry, Seems

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• When all my friends insisted that they were feeling jaded, it struck me as an affected pose. To me, everything is always new.

  John Darnielle

  Feelings, My Friends, Jaded

  "The Mountain Goats". Interview with Larry Fitzmaurice, pitchfork.com. October 1, 2012.

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• May we all emerge from winter with our strength renewed and any unwanted pieces left under the ice.

  John Darnielle

  Winter, Ice, Pieces

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• Every place on earth has a frequency. It's not good or bad, it's just the way it is, and if you can attune yourself to that frequency, then you can find comfort in that.

  John Darnielle

  Comfort, Earth, Way

  "The Mountain Goats". Interview with Larry Fitzmaurice, pitchfork.com. October 1, 2012.

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• I think I read too much Arthur Conan Doyle when I was young, and got this idea that a gentleman should know a lot about one thing and plenty about most everything else.

  John Darnielle

  Thinking, Ideas, Gentleman

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• A novel is a performance you have to plan.

  John Darnielle

  Novel, Plans, Performances

  Source: www.motherjones.com

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• [Robert] Aikman would write horror stories that weren't gore, they weren't slashers, and they weren't monster stories either. He called them ghost stories. The main thing about them was the vibe. It was really disquieting. He wanted to sketch the scene so that you could see it and know the characters and get a feel for the motion - and then ask yourself why and not get a final answer. Leave something that itches. I loved that!

  John Darnielle

  Character, Writing, Horror Stories

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