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John Steinbeck Quotes - Page 25

All Quotes Ambition Art Business Challenges Chaos Character Children Choices Confusion Country Criticism Design Desire Doubt Dying Earth Effort Evil Fate Fear Feelings Fighting Freedom Friendship Giving Gold Greatness Greed Guilt Hate Hatred Heart Heaven Hell Home Honesty Horror House Hunger Hurt Inspirational Journey Joy Kindness Laughter Life Literature Loneliness Loss Love Luck Lying Magic Mathematics Memories Morning Mountain Nature Obsession Pain Past Philosophy Pleasure Prayer Pride Quality Rain Reading Reality Responsibility Running Sadness Science Sickness Sin Singing Sleep Socialism Son Sorrow Soul Struggle Suffering Summer Teaching Travel Understanding Waiting Wall War Water Wife Winning Winter Worry Writing

... every little boy thinks he invented sin.

... every little boy thinks he invented sin.

Boys, Thinking, Littles

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.235, Penguin

(Suicide) takes some doing, with maybe pain and maybe hell.

Suicide, Pain, Hell

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.359, Penguin

If a man ordered a beer milk shake, he thought, he'd better do it in a town where he wasn't known.

Beer, Men, Towns

"Cannery Row".

Lennie said quietly, "It ain't no lie. We're gonna do it. Gonna get a little place an' live on the fatta the lan'.

Lying, Littles, Lennie

John Steinbeck (1994). “Of Mice and Men”, p.55, Penguin

The cars of the migrant people crawled out of the side roads onto the great cross-country highway, and they took the migrant way to the West.... And because they were lonely and perplexed, because they had all come from a place of sadness and worry and defeat, and because they were all going to a mysterious new place, ... a strange thing happened: the twenty families became one family, the children were the children of all. The loss of home became one loss, and the golden time in the West was one dream.

Country, Dream, Lonely

I seen it over an' over—a guy talkin' to another guy and it don't make no difference if he don't hear or understand. The thing is, they're talkin', or they're settin' still not talkin'. It don't make no difference, no difference. [...] George can tell you screwy things, and it don't matter. It's just the talking. It's just bein' with another guy. That's all.

Talking, Differences, Guy

John Steinbeck (1953). “The Short Novels of John Steinbeck”, New York : Viking Press

Liza poured thick batter from a pitcher onto a soapstone griddle. The hot cakes rose like little hassocks, and small volcanoes formed and erupted on them until they were ready to be turned. A cheerful brown, they were, with tracings of darker brown. And the kitchen was full of the good sweet smell of them.

Sweet, Food, Volcanoes

The people in flight from the terror behind-strange things happen to them, some bitterly cruel and some so beautiful that the faith is refired forever.

Beautiful, People, Forever

John Steinbeck (2016). “The Grapes of Wrath”, p.96, Hamilton Books

When you collect marine animals there are certain flat worms so delicate that they are almost impossible to capture whole, for they break and tatter under the touch. You must let them ooze and crawl of their own will onto a knife blade and then lift them gently into your bottle of sea water. And perhaps that might be the way to write this book — to open the page and let the stories crawl in by themselves.

Book, Writing, Marine

"Cannery Row".

A strange species we are, We can stand anything God and nature can throw at us save only plenty. If I wanted to destroy a nation, I would give it too much, and I would have it on its knees, miserable, greedy, sick. --John Steinbeck to Adlai Stevenson

Giving, Sick, Knees

John Steinbeck (2003). “America and Americans and Selected Nonfiction”, p.97, Penguin

It isn't like the rest of the country - it is like a nation itself - more tolerant than the rest in a curious way. Littleness gets swallowed up here. All the viciousness that makes other cities vicious is sucked up and absorbed in New York.

Country, New York, Cities

John Steinbeck (2001). “A Life in Letters”, p.401, Penguin UK

It was deeply a part of Lee's kindness and understanding that man's right to kill himself is inviolable, but sometimes a friend can make it unnecessary

Kindness, Men, Understanding

John Steinbeck (1993). “Cannery Row”, p.13, Penguin

I have seen too many men go down, and I never permit myself to forget that one day, through accident or under the charge of a younger, stronger knight, I too will go down.

Men, Knights, One Day

John Steinbeck (2008). “The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)”, p.125, Penguin

The writer is delegated to declare and to celebrate man's proven capacity for greatness of heart and spirit—for gallantry in defeat, for courage, compassion and love. In the endless war against weakness and despair, these are the bright rally flags of hope and of emulation. I hold that a writer who does not believe in the perfectibility of man has no dedication nor any membership in literature.

War, Believe, Heart

John Steinbeck (2003). “America and Americans and Selected Nonfiction”, p.146, Penguin

A boy gets to be a man when a man is needed. Remember this thing. I have known boys forty years old because there was no need for a man.

Boys, Men, Years

John Steinbeck (1995). “The Long Valley”, p.51, Penguin

Not only do the brave get killed, but the brave have a better chance of it.

Brave, Chance

John Steinbeck (2008). “The Winter of Our Discontent”, p.188, Penguin

And then we take a soldier and put murder in his hands and we say to him, "Use it well, use it wisely.

Hands, Eden, Soldier

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.25, Penguin

Then the hard, dry Spaniards came exploring through, greedy and realistic, and their greed was for gold or God. They collected souls as they collected jewels. They gathered mountains and valleys, rivers and whole horizons, the way a man might now gain tittle to building lots.

Men, Jewels, Rivers

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.11, Penguin

Why do men like me want sons? he wondered. It must be because they hope in their poor beaten souls that these new men, who are their blood, will do the things they were not strong enough nor wise enough nor brave enough to do. It is rather like another chance at life; like a new bag of coins at a table of luck after your fortune is gone.

Wise, Strong, Son

John Steinbeck (2008). “Cup of Gold: A Life of Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer, with Occasional Reference to History”, p.41, Penguin

And their greed was for gold or God. They collected souls as they collected jewels.

Jewels, Greed, Soul

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.11, Penguin

Literature was not promulgated by a pale and emasculated critical priesthood singing their litanies in empty churches, nor is it a game for the cloistered elect, the tinhorn mendicants of low calorie despair.

Games, Singing, Despair

William Faulkner, Eugene O'Neill, John Steinbeck (1971). “William Faulkner, Eugene O'Neill [and] John Steinbeck”

The Mexican War was a training ground for generals, so that when the sad self-murders settled on us, the leaders knew the techniques for making it properly horrible.

War, Self, Mexican

Some men ease themselves like setting hens into the nest of death.

Men, Ease, Nests

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.113, Penguin

Dear Lord,' he said. 'let me be like Aron. Don’t make me mean. I don’t want to be. If you will let everybody like me, why, I’ll give you anything in the world, and if I haven’t got it, why, I’ll go for to get it. I don’t want to be mean. I don’t want to be lonely. For Jesus’ sake, Amen.

Lonely, Jesus, Mean

John Steinbeck (2002). “East of Eden”, p.333, Penguin

'I know,' said Winter, 'but they don't know.' And he went on with a thought he had been having. 'A time-minded people,' he said, 'and the time is nearly up. They think that just because they have only one leader and one head, we are all like that. They know that ten heads lopped off will destroy them, but we are a free people; we have as many heads as we have people, and in a time of need leaders pop up among us like mushrooms.'

Winter, Thinking, Mushrooms

John Steinbeck (2009). “The Short Novels of John Steinbeck: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)”, p.340, Penguin

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