Quotes by David Denby

“The action comes at us through a buzz of nattering remarks.”

“Trivial details have been summoned, in part, to make a satirical point about upper-middle-class marriage-that the whole thing can slip away between the white wine and the arugula salad.”

“was a man telling his bosses what they wanted to hear.”

“a lovely guy - charming, enthusiastic, eager and modest.”

“One problem with capitalism is that it can create an envious attitude toward ones peers. It can hurt friendships seriously, and thats particularly true in New York. Its a kind of functional paranoia. ... Thats the downside of our free and open system.”

“The one thing I cant forgive [Henry] for was ... the ratings were really a code intended for institutional buyers. They would know the actual rating was two degrees off the stated one. But the rest of his clients did not know that.”

“There wasnt much of a story. I told the publisher Ive got to keep this going.”

“Im cured of my stock mania. Im very conservative these days. But this is not about investment. This is about finding a place large enough for two grown-ups, settled in their ways, where sons and daughters can visit.”

“His real intention appears to be to deliver a blow to the patella of a conglomerate-controlled press corps that, until recently, has indulged the Bush administrations most extravagant smears and lies, ... He has completely succeeded.”

“His real intention appears to be to deliver a blow to the patella of a conglomerate-controlled press corps that, until recently, has indulged the Bush administrations most extravagant smears and lies. He has completely succeeded.”

If you dont read books, and if you dont get consumed by the physical and moral life of men and women in fiction and history, too many facets of yourself may never come into being.

The trouble with todays snarky pipsqueaks who break off a sentence or two, or who write a couple of mean paragraphs, is that they dont go far enough; they dont have a coherent view of life. Spinning around in the media from moment to moment, they dont stand for anything, push for anything; theyre mere opportunists without dedication, and they dont win any victories.

Snark often functions as an enforcer of mediocrity and conformity. In its cozy knowingness, snark flatters you by assuming that you get the contemptuous joke. Youve been admitted, or readmitted, to a club, though it may be the club of the second-rate.

Corporate irony not only ridicules the thing it is selling but the very act of selling it. In the process it disarms critics by making anyone who goes against the flow of commerce seem clueless.