“Suits obviously had helped to promote bad government and he was as guilty as anyone for wearing them so steadfastly for twenty years. Of late he had become frightened of the government for the first time in his life, the way the structure of democracy had begun debasing people rather than enlivening them in their mutual concern. The structure was no longer concerned with the purpose for which it was designed, and a small part of the cause, Nordstrom thought, was probably that all politicians and bureaucrats wore suits.”

American poet, novelist, and essayist

Jim Harrison was an American poet, novelist, and essayist. He wrote across the 20th and early 21st centuries, and remains best known for the range of his work and for the poems he valued most. He is associated with 113 quotes on this site. Harrison published more than three dozen books in poetry, fiction, nonfiction, children’s literature, and memoir. He also wrote screenplays, book reviews, and literary criticism, and he published essays on food, travel, and sport. Among his many forms, he said poetry mattered most to him.