The Impossible Takes Longer:
The Wisest 1000 Things Ever Said
by Nobel Prize Laureates

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Since 1901, The Nobel Prize has been the hallmark of genius.  But Nobel laureates tend to be more than brilliant—their idealism, courage, and concern for humanity has also made them sources of inspiration and wisdom. This book brings together quotations from some 250 Nobel laureates, representing all six areas of Peace, Literature, Chemistry, Medicine, Physics, and Economics. Their observations range from the witty to the philosophical from the ironic to the prophetic, from the whimsical to the profound.  The quotations are complemented by short biographies of all of the laureates cited, offering a fascinating glimpse into the lives and minds of the most brilliant thinkers of our time.

If I knew what leads one to the Nobel Prize, I wouldn’t tell you, but go get another one. 
             Richard Laughlin   Physics, 1998. 

The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement.  The opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth. 
             Niels Bohr.  Physics, 1922.

In a room where people unanimously maintain a conspiracy of silence, one word of truth sounds like a pistol shot. 
             Czeslaw Milosz.  Literature, 1980. 

Man is born broken.  He lives by mending.  The grace of God is glue.  
             Eugene O’Neill.  Literature, 1936. 

Jerónimo, my grandfather, swineherd and story-teller, feeling death about to arrive and take him, went and said goodbye to the trees in the yard, one by one, embracing them and crying because he knew he wouldn't see them again. 
             José Saramago.  Literature, 1998

If, after all, men cannot always make history have a meaning, they can always act so that their own lives have one. 
             Albert Camus.  Literature, 1957

At every crossroads on the path that leads to the future, tradition has placed 10,000 men to guard the past. 
             Maurice Maeterlinck.  Literature, 1911. 

A man does not have to be an angel in order to be a saint.
             Albert Schweitzer.  Peace, 1952

If this is a world of vice and woe, I’ll take the vice and you can have the woe. 
             Winston Churchill.  Literature, 1953. 

I have been called indispensable and a miracle worker.  I know, because I remember every word I say. 
            Henry Kissinger.  Peace, 1973.