List of William Manchester Quotes

His [gen. Douglas Macarthurs] Twenty-two Medals-thirteen Of Them For Heroism-probably Exceeded Those Of Any Other Figure In American History. He Seemed To Seek Death On Battlefields.

An Edwardian Lady In Full Dress Was A Wonder To Behold, And Her Preparations For Viewing Were Awesome.

I Realized That The Worst Thing That Could Happen To Me Was About To Happen To Me.

The Colors Of The Underwater Rock [are] As Pale And Delicate As Those In The Wardrobe Of An 18th-century Marchioness.

He [gen. Douglas Macarthur] Was A Great Thundering Paradox Of A Man, Noble And Ignoble, Inspiring And Outrageous, Arrogant And Shy, The Best Of Men And The Worst Of Men, The Most Protean, Most Ridiculous, And Most Sublime.

I Came To A Dead Stop And Began Major Revisions. Sometimes These Entailed The Shredding Of All Existing Manuscript For A Fresh Start - An Inefficient Way To Write A Book, Though I Found It Exciting.

Japanese Naval Officers In Dress Whites Are Frequent Guests At Pearl Harbor's Officers' Mess And Are Very Polite. They Always Were. Except, Of Course, For That Little Interval There Between 1941 And 1945.

They Fought On With A Devotion Which Would Puzzle The Generation Of The 1980s. More Surprising, In Many Instances It Would Have Baffled The Men They Themselves Were Before Pearl Harbor. Among Macarthur's Ardent Infantrymen Were Cooks, Mechanics, Pilots Whose Planes Had Been Shot Down, Seamen Whose Ships Had Been Sunk, And Some Civilian Volunteers.

It Is True That Despite Occasional Gleams Of Churchillian Eloquence He [gen. Douglas Macarthur] Usually Spoke Poorly. He Was Far More Effective In Conversations A Deux. But Those Who Dismiss Him As Shallow Because His Rhetoric Was Fustian Err.

His [gen. Douglas Macarthur's] Own Heroes Were Lincoln And Washington, And In Some Ways He Resembled Them. Like Them, He Was Slandered And Misunderstood.

One Strange Feeling, Which I Remember Clearly, Was A Powerful Link With The Slain, Particularly Those That Had Fallen Within The Past Hour Or Two. There Was So Much Death Around That Life Seemed Almost Indecent. Some Men's Uniforms Were Soaked With Gobs Of Blood. The Ground Was Sodden With It. I Killed, Too.

He [gen. Douglas Macarthur] Never Went To Church, But He Read The Bible Every Day And Regarded Himself As One Of The World's Two Great Defenders Of Christendom. (the Other Was The Pope.)