Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
For me, soccer was a dance.
The eye always fills in the imperfections.
Close friends consider me a literary snob.
Soccer is the most widely played sport in the U.S.
Every writer uses his own way to motivate oneself.
I couldn't tell the truth if my life depended on it.
I believe one has to escape oneself to discover oneself.
I read Shakespeare when I was 14 because it's what we were taught.
A game of soccer induces more than enjoyment, more than entertainment.
When I wrote my first book, 'Koolaids,' I felt rejected and not wanted.
What is the purpose of a city if not to grant the greatest of gifts, anonymity?
I get upset about what is taken as great literature and what is cute and exotic.
When I was younger, I used to find stories about divas charming. Not much anymore.
I always say show me a storyteller who doesn't embellish, and I'll show you a bad one.
Homophobia is rampant in soccer, probably more so than in any other sport. I'm not sure why.
If I were to pray in Arabic, I'd pray to Allah. If I were to pray in English, I'd pray to God.
I can make up stories with the best of them. I've been telling stories since I was a little kid.
Nobody ever calls me a soccer-playing writer, even though I play soccer and it's part of who I am.
As teenagers, a lot of us just did not want much to do with Arabic culture - we looked to the West.
No one needs to be reminded of racism in soccer: the xenophobia, the nativism and, yes, nationalism.
I started writing half a paragraph of a mystery novel, half a paragraph there, and they were terrible.
I have to admit, I'm not patriotic. It has partly to do with principle, but it is also a phobia/neurosis.
In school in Lebanon, we were not allowed to speak Arabic during breaks - it had to be French or English.
I know many sports fans that don't enjoy soccer. The argument is that there's no action, not enough of it.
Whenever I come across an Arabic word mired in English text, I am momentarily shocked out of the narrative.
In 1982, Algeria made their first appearance at the World Cup. I believe it was the first Arab country to do so.
For someone like me and my generation, you had to speak French to be sophisticated, you had to be lighter-skinned.
I jokingly say if there was one great thing about, you know, the Lebanese Civil War was that it forced me to read.
I gave up on the delusion that these players enjoy soccer as much as I do, that they play for the love of the game.
The reasons why a player is better on one club than on another are many. I certainly am not an expert and can't explain.
I can easily hold two opposing beliefs at the same time without any problem, which I find - well, mind-expanding, really.
I wonder if being sane means disregarding the chaos that is life, pretending only an infinitesimal segment of it is reality.
When the Lebanese Civil War started in 1975, I was 15. I was shipped to boarding school in England and, after that, to UCLA.
My father loved Brazilian football, a diehard follower, so of course, he hated Germany and always rooted against them, always.
One of the things I enjoy most during the World Cup is watching a team improve, mature, and gel during the course of the tournament.
I always assumed that everyone knew no country would ever be awarded a World Cup without pricey gifts exchanging hands under the tables.
I loved problems on paper, and I was good at math, but I was a mechanical engineer, and I never understood - or cared to - how a car worked.
There are two kinds of people in this world: people who want to be desired, and people who want to be desired so much that they pretend they don't.
I oscillate between being cynical and being naive on a regular basis. I always think that not much shocks me until something much too obvious does.
The relationship between France and its 'foreign' players - blacks and North African Arabs - has always been troubled, particularly with Algerians.
If you want to know whether soccer is big in America, pick a weekend, go to any park in the land, and pay attention. We're there. We've always been.
There are over 1 million refugees in Lebanon, a country of 4 million people. How do we solve that? I have no idea. What's going on, I really don't know.
I long ago abandoned myself to a blind lust for the written word. Literature is my sandbox. In it I play, build my forts and castles, spend glorious time.
I was gay before I began to play soccer over 40 years ago. It's been 28 years since a friend and I organized one of the first gay soccer teams in the world.
I think I'm being conservative when I say there are more people playing soccer in the United States than in 90% of the world's other countries, probably 95%.
...What happens is of little significance compared with the stories we tell ourselves about what happens. Events matter little, only stories of events affect us.
We seem, particularly over here in the West and in America in particular, to have forgotten that we are, in large measures, the story we tell ourselves about ourselves.
I wonder whether there is such a thing as a sense of individuality. Is it all a facade, covering a deep need to belong? Are we simply pack animals desperately trying to pretend we are not?
'Harat' is actually - it's a Lebanese dialect word. It comes from 'the mapmaker,' somebody who makes a map. And it basically means somebody who tells fibs or exaggerate tales a little bit.
In 1975, I left the burning city of Beirut for the quiet insanity of England. To say that short, frail and wispy 15-year-old me didn't fit in would be such an understatement as to be a joke.