John Steinbeck Quotes

To the heavens on the wings of a pig.

It is the nature of a man as he grows older, a small bridge intime, toprotest againstchange, particularlychangefor the better.

To the red country and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred earth.

What do I want in a doctor? Perhaps more than anything else-a friend with special knowledge.

Intentions, good or bad, are not enough. There's luck or fate or something else that takes over.

There's something desirable about anything you're used to as opposed to something you're not.

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

Muscles aching to work, minds aching to create - this is man.

There's more beauty in truth, even if it is dreadful beauty.

Perhaps my greatest wisdom is the knowledge that I do not know.

It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world.

Your audience is one single reader. I have found that sometimes it helps to pick out one person-a real person you know, or an imagined person-and write to that one.

The weight of knowledge is too great for one mind to absorb.

There are times that one treasures for all one's life, and such times are burned clearly and sharply on the material of total recall. I felt very fortunate that morning.

All this wondering was the weather vane on top of the building of unrest and of discontent

I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that'swhy.

Maybe ever’body in the whole damn world is scared of each other.

War did not make a killer of me, although for a time I killed men.

In business and in politics a man must carve and maul his way through men to get to be King of the Mountain. Once there, he can be great and kind--but he must get there first.

And the women who had thought they wanted dresses never realized that what they had wanted was happiness.

I've always been amused by the contention that brain work is harder than manual labor. I've never known a man to leave a desk for a muck-stick if he could avoid it.

In uncertainty I am certain that underneath their topmost layer of frailty men want to be good and want be loved. Indeed most of their vices are attempted short cuts to love.

It was a morning like other mornings and yet perfect among mornings.

A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think youcontrol it.

Money does not change the sickness, only the symptoms.

...without money you cannot fight money.

Well, a man's mind can't stay in time the way his body does.

Suddenly he knew joy and sorrow felted into one fabric. Courage and fear were one thing too.

A dying organism is often observed to be capable of extraordinary endurance and strength. ... When any living organism is attacked, its whole function seems to aim toward reproduction.

They got to live before they can afford to die.

Caleb and Aaron—now you are people and you have joined the fraternity and you have the right to be damned.

Guys like us got nothing to look ahead to.

Henry liked fun and avoided when he could any solemn or serious matter, for he confused these with sorrow.

When two men live together they usually maintain a kind of shabby neatness out of incipient rage at each other. Two men alone are constantly on the verge of fighting, and they know it.

During the years he was never sick, except of course for the chronic indigestion which was universal, and still is, with men who live alone, cook for themselves, and eat in solitude.

Memory of the knife will be gone when the flesh is gone.

You don't even know where I'm going.""I don't care. I'd like to go anywhere.

And then I saw what I was to see so many times on the journey--a look of longing. "Lord! I wish I could go.

An' I got to thinkin', on'y it wasn't thinkin', it was deeper down than thinkin'.

... but she was also bewilderingly lonely... Abra had lost her gift for being alone.

He stopped, feeling lonely in his long speech.

I don't want advice.' 'Nobody does. It's a giver's present.

Some people think it’s an insult to the glory of their sickness to get well.

A reputation for money is almost as negotiable as money itself.

No one doubts your courage, but you are a headstrong knight and when you choose a way you cannot change your course even if it lead to your destruction. That is your fault and your destiny.

...evil must constantly respawn, while good, while virtue, is immortal. Vice has always a new fresh young face, while virtue is venerable as nothing else in the world is.

It is astounding to find that the belly of every black and evil thing is white as snow. And it is saddening to discover how the concealed parts of angels are leprous.

Her face looked for the answer that is always concealed in language.

And is usually true of a man of one idea, [Charles] became obsessed.

Hate cannot live alone. It must have love as a trigger, a goad or a stimulant