A suburban mother's role is to deliver children obstetrically once, and by car forever after.

— Peter De Vries

But I made an issue of the precise wording of the vows. I wanted liberalized ones, with no outmoded Pauline nonsense exacting from the bride the promise to 'obey' the groom. Here I put my foot down, rather in the manner of a husband determined to show at the outset who was boss. 'I'll have no obedience around here!' I said, banging the table. 'Is that clear?'' Is it an order?'' Yes.

— Peter De Vries

Deep down, he's shallow.

— Peter De Vries

Gluttony is an emotional escape, a sign something is eating us.

— Peter De Vries

How I hate this world. I would like to tear it apart with my own two hands if I could. I would like to dismantle the universe star by star, like a tuneful of rotten fruit. Nor do I believe in progress. A vermin-eaten saint scratching his filth for heaven is better off than you damned in clean linen. Progress doubles our tenure in a vale of tears. Man is a mistake, to be corrected only by his abolition, which he gives promise of seeing to himself. Oh, let him pass, and leave the earth to the flowers that carpet the earth wherever he explodes his triumphs. Man is inconsolable, thanks to that eternal "Why?" when there is no Why, that question mark twisted like a fishhook in the human heart. "Let there be light," we cry, and only the dawn breaks.

— Peter De Vries

Human nature is pretty shabby stuff, as you may know from introspection.

— Peter De Vries

I love being a writer. What I can't stand is the paperwork.

— Peter De Vries

I made a tentative conclusion. It seemed from all of this that uppermost among human joys is the negative one of restoration: not going to the stars, but learning that one may stay where one is.

— Peter De Vries

Let us hope...that a kind Providence will put a speedy end to the acts of God under which we have been laboring.

— Peter De Vries

Murals in restaurants are on a par with the food in museums.

— Peter De Vries