John Updike Quotes

And revolutions always mean the breakdown of old authority.

A reform is a correction of abuses; a revolution is a transfer of power.

The word 'revolution' is a word for which you kill, for which you die, for which you send the labouring masses to their deaths; but which does not contain any content.

There is no more democratic government than a revolutionary government.

A government creates its own revolution. There can be no revolt without it.

War will bring the revolution; revolution will stop the war.

With the exception of capitalism, there is nothing so revolting as revolution.

Three words remain that can yet stir the blood of man: the word 'rebellion'; the word 'revolt'; the word 'revolution'.

A revolution is an act of violence whereby one class shatters the authority of another.

The generation which commences a revolution can rarely complete it

it is not the topping of a regime that determines the overall success of a revolution -- it's dismantling the past in favor of a better future.

A revolution is generally only evolution--an explosive sequence of events crowded into a short space of time, but leaving more of the ancient regime untouched than usually is at first apparent.

For years I looked at the Iranians with envy - not at the outcome of their 1979 revolution, but because it was a popular uprising, not a euphemism for a coup.

Revolt and revolution both wind up at the same crossroads: the police, or folly.

All revolutions are treason until they are accomplished.

Revolution means turning the wheel.

Every revolution has its counter-revolution.

The literal meaning of the Chinese characters for revolution is elimination of life

Violent revolutions usually only mean a change of personnel at the top.

A revolution is sometimes necessary, but if revolutions become habitual the country in which they take place is going down-hill

When you think of power, you think the state has power. When you look at it in terms of revolution, in terms of the state, you think of it in terms of Russia, the Soviet Union, and how those who struggled for power actually became victims of the state, prisoners of the state, and how that led to the dissolution of the Soviet Union. We have to think of revolution much more in terms of transitions from one epoch to another.

In a revolution one wins or dies, if it is a real one

The Syrian people, the Egyptian people, all say that something is changing. The Berlin Wall has fallen. We can see it.

I am still praying for revolution.