Sinclair Lewis Quotes

Generally speaking, they [Americans] are not a people we should be proud to acknowledge as our relations.

Most Americans are exceptionalists; we think we live outside of history.

An apology for America's values is never the right course.

American patriotism is now jingoism. American Greatness is made fun of. The concept of "Make America Great Again" or American exceptionalism is lampooned. It is impugned. It is attacked. The effort to globalize our society and make us feel, as many of us as possible, that there's nothing special about being an American, that we ought to think of ourselves as citizens of the world, and in that context America is a problem because we have too much, we've done too much, we owe too much, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

In general, American life is more easy-going. And civic pride, national pride in a cultural sense, is great in America. I think what they esteem in America is character and energy, and being different and superior to other peoples. Of course, every nation feels itself to be superior, but in America it's a jaunty feeling, and in some cases a rather ominous one among the super-patriots.

One thing that America is objectively exceptional at is overreacting whenever anyone accuses them of not being exceptional.

We don't have to apologize for American exceptionalism or western values.

The American attitude is 'We're the best'. That's why the NBA guys who come from other countries, the Europeans, all sort of stick together away from the game.

I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.

There is a fuzzy but real distinction that can and I believe should be made, between patriotism, which is attachment to a way of life, and nationalism, which is the insistence that your way of life deserves to rule over other ways of life.

I think it's unfair to criticise someone for not being Welsh, but the smaller the nation, the more patriotic you seem to be.

I believe the United States is the greatest country on Earth. I really do.

They're very nationalistic the French - or they used to be. Very insular. Pretty arrogant.

I don't feel like I have to be nationalistic French because I'm afraid of losing whatever. No, no, no, no. And also I don't think we are the best.

I don't know whether it is fortunate or unfortunate, but I have no such thing as national pride. I don't feel proud that I am Iranian. I happen to be who I am.

I am extremely proud to have the surname Ambani. I am proud to be a Gujarati, and above all, an extremely proud Indian.

France will always be France no matter what, but America involves striving toward an ideal.

After the spiritual powers, there is no thing in the world more unconquerable than the spirit of nationality. The spirit of nationality in Ireland will persist even though the mightiest of material powers be its neighbor.

I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.

If a man is going to be an American at all let him be so without any qualifying adjectives, and if he is going to be something else, let him drop the word American from his personal description.

We thought that whatever we wanted to do was right and good, simply because we were Americans, and we would succeed at it because we were Americans.

American cinema tends to express a patriotic relationship to national identity on a regular basis.

I'm very American.

This self-congratulatory notion Americans have that their country is Number One is borne of ignorance and bad manners.

We are not America. We are Afghanistan.