The ’60s aren’t over; they won’t be over until the Fat Lady gets high.
Meaning of the quote
The quote means that the spirit and culture of the 1960s is still present today, and won't go away until something dramatic or unexpected happens. The "Fat Lady" refers to a metaphor for the end or conclusion of an event, like in an opera when the fat lady sings to signal the performance is over. So the quote suggests the 1960s counterculture and ideas have not truly ended, and won't until something really surprising or unusual occurs.
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More quotes from Ken Kesey
It’s time to move on to the next step in the psychedelic revolution. We’ve reached a certain point, but we’re not moving any more.
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Man, when you lose your laugh you lose your footing.
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There’s a lot of people who don’t understand the circle crops in England. Pure enigma.
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When we first broke into that forbidden box in the other dimension, we knew we had discovered something as surprising and powerful as the New World when Columbus came stumbling onto it.
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Nowhere else in history has there ever been a flag that stands for the right to burn itself. This is the fractal of our flag. It stands for the right to destroy itself.
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People don’t want other people to get high, because if you get high, you might see the falsity of the fabric of the society we live in.
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The Grateful Dead are our religion. This is a religion that doesn’t pay homage to the God that all the other religions pay homage to.
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The truth doesn’t have to do with cruelty, the truth has to do with mercy.
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You’ve got to get out and pray to the sky to appreciate the sunshine; otherwise you’re just a lizard standing there with the sun shining on you.
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I used to think we were going to win in the ’60s. Nixon went out and I thought we won.
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The ’60s aren’t over; they won’t be over until the Fat Lady gets high.
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Tricker the Squirrel is the best piece I ever wrote. It’s intricate.
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To hell with facts! We need stories!
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I was raised a Christian and was a stone-faced acid head.
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Me and Norman Mailer have talked about how hard it is in America to get better. Especially at writing.
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The frontiers we broke into in the ’60s are still largely unexplored.
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The Haight is just a place; the ’60s was a spirit.
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You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.
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Loved. You can’t use it in the past tense. Death does not stop that love at all.
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When Shakespeare was writing, he wasn’t writing for stuff to lie on the page; it was supposed to get up and move around.
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If grass were legalized, it would help our drug problem enormously.
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I’ve been to too many Dead concerts. There’ve been smokin’ holes where my memory used to be.
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Leary can get a part of my mind that’s kind of rusted shut grinding again, just by being around him and talking.
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Allen Ginsberg is a tremendous warrior as time goes by. He’s a warrior first and a poet second.
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The fundamentalists have taken the fun out of the mental.
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The trouble with super heroes is what to do between phone booths.
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People think love is an emotion. Love is good sense.
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Listen, wait, and be patient. Every shaman knows you have to deal with the fire that’s in your audience’s eye.
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Fascism wants Baptism coast to coast.
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When you’re around the whole Dead scene, they’re there as a tribal thing; they’re there as part of a rendezvous and a pow-wow.
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Ritual is necessary for us to know anything.
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I’d rather be a lightning rod than a seismograph.
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Take what you can use and let the rest go by.
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If you’re a Conservative, why aren’t you behind conserving the land?
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There’s something about taking a plow and breaking new ground. It gives you energy.
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You can’t really be strong until you see a funny side to things.
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The Republican consciousness has no integrity and it falls apart once you check it out. If you’re a Christian, why would you want to fry this dude?
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