Life and Art Quotes

“The case I would like to make to my grandfather is that I'm no more to blame for any of this than I am for global warming, the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the cesspool of social media or our politically polarized country. The problem is that while I may not be responsible for the growing divide between the world's haves and its have-nots, it's also true, or at least it feels true, that the world's disarray is worsening on my watch. What I'd like is to be let off the hook to be absolved of all wrongdoing, when in truth I feel both complicit and utterly helpless. Though I live in the present, I can't help feeling that I owe an apology to both the past and the future.”
― Richard Russo, Life and Art: Essays

“More than anything, what I think we're all wondering is whether what we're living through right now is a breakup story. We keep hearing that there are two Americas. If those Americas are going through a divorce, how will our grandchildren tell that story? Will they conclude that it was tragic and preventable? Or will they remember us as ill-matched from the start and conclude that it was only a matter of time before our differences became irreconcilable?”
― Richard Russo, Life and Art: Essays

“In reference to the pandemic/divided America...We hear repeatedly that the events since have revealed that there are two Americas - one rich, one poor; one Black, one white; one red, one blue; one urban, one rural; one educated, one not. Isn't it possible that those same events have also exposed another divide - between those with active, healthy inner lives and those seeking distraction because they don't?”
― Richard Russo, Life and Art: Essays

“So, is there hope for us, and for America, or are we witnessing the end of our experiment in democracy? On bad days I'm inclined to believe the latter, because we seem to have been assigned the impossible task of putting the toothpaste back in the tube even as others continue to squeeze it.”
― Richard Russo, Life and Art: Essays