One day President Roosevelt told me that he was asking publicly for suggestions about what the war should be called. I said at once 'The Unnecessary War'.

About Thomas Mann

Portrait of Thomas Mann

Paul Thomas Mann (6 June 1875 – 12 August 1955) was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and the 1929 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate. His highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas are noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and...

More quotations from Thomas Mann

No man remains quite what he was when he recognizes himself.

vision recognition enlightenment

Nothing is stranger or more ticklish than a relationship between people who know each other only by sight, who meet and observe each other daily—no, hourly—and are nevertheless compelled to keep up the pose of an indifferent stranger, neither greeting nor addressing each other, whether out of etiquette or their own whim.

silence relationship communication strangers

It is love, not reason, that is stronger than death.

love strength death immortality

A writer is a person for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.

difficulty writing

A great truth is a truth whose opposite is also a truth.

truth opposites

More quotations tagged with “war”

Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.

—Theodore Roosevelt

It is well that war is so terrible—otherwise we would grow too fond of it.

—Solomon Short

Either war is obsolete or men are.

—Winston Churchill

The way to win an atomic war is to make certain it never starts.

—Winston Churchill

I think the mark of a great ruler, is not his ability to make war but to achieve peace.

—Robert E. Lee

History

11 Jul 2015 Added