Quotes by
John Steinbeck |
1902-1968 , American writer, Nobel 1962
One of the most famous and most widely read American writers of the 20th century. He is widely known for the epic East of Eden (1952), and the novellas The Red Pony (1933) and Of Mice and Men (1937). The Pulitzer Prize-winning The Grapes of Wrath (1939) is considered Steinbeck's masterpiece and part of the American literary canon.
He won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature.
| 56 quotes | 3,420 visits |
Quotations
| • | Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat, but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires. 17 |
| • | I wonder how many people I’ve looked at all my life and never seen. 8 |
| • | An ocean without unnamed monsters would be like sleep without dreams. 2 |
| • | Being at ease with himself put him at ease with the world. 2 |
| • | It would be absurd if we did not understand both angels and devils, since we invented them. 2 |
| • | Time is the only critic without ambition. 1 |
| • | The techniques of opening conversation are universal. I knew long ago and rediscovered that the best way to attract attention, help, and conversation is to be lost. 1 |
| • | We have usurped many of the powers we once ascribed to God. 1 |
| • | Unless a reviewer has the courage to give you unqualified praise, I say ignore the bastard. 1 |
| • | The writer must believe that what he is doing is the most important thing in the world. And he must hold to this illusion even when he knows it is not true. 1 |
| • | In utter loneliness a writer tries to explain the inexplicable. 1 |
| • | Writers are a little below clowns and a little above trained seals. 1 |
| • | I believe a strong woman may be stronger than a man, particularly if she happens to have love in her heart. I guess a loving woman is indestructible. 1 |
| • | Once you have lived in New York and made it your home, no place else is good enough. 1 |
| • | Nearly everybody has his box of secret pain, shared with no one. 1 |
| • | Literature is as old as speech. It grew out of human need for it, and it has not changed except to become more needed. 1 |
| • | Only God sees the sparrow fall, but even God doesn’t do anything about it. 1 |
| • | If you want to keep a friend, never test him. 1 |
| • | If you find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics suck. 1 |
| • | No one wants advice – only corroboration. 1 |
| • | You are one of the rare people who can separate your observation from your preconception. You see what is, where most people see what they expect. 1 |
| • | It is not good to want a thing too much. It sometimes drives the luck away. You must want it just enough, and you must be very tactful with the gods. 1 |
| • | I find out of long experience that I admire all nations and hate all governments. 1 |
| • | The free exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. 1 |
| • | Thoughts are slow and deep and golden in the morning. 1 |
| • | It is the hour of pearl – the interval between day and night when time stops and examines itself. 1 |
| • | It is the nature of man to rise to greatness if greatness is expected of him. 1 |
| • | I've seen a look in dogs' eyes, a quickly vanishing look of amazed contempt, and I am convinced that basically dogs think humans are nuts. 1 |
| • | I suppose our capacity for self-delusion is boundless. 1 |
| • | Man has a choice and it’s a choice that makes him a man. 1 |
| • | Muscles aching to work, minds aching to create – this is man. 1 |
| • | A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it. 1 |
| • | Don’t make everyone know about your sadness. 1 |
| • | The quality of owning freezes you forever in “I,” and cuts you off forever from the “we.” 1 |
| • | I wonder why progress looks so much like destruction. 1 |
| • | I am happy to report that in the war between reality and romance, reality is not the stronger. 1 |
| • | A man without words is a man without thought. 1 |
| • | When a man says he does not want to speak of something, he usually means he can think of nothing else. 1 |
| • | I shall revenge myself in the cruelest way you can imagine. I shall forget it. 1 |
| • | If you’re in trouble, or hurt or need, go to the poor people. They’re the only ones that’ll help – the only ones. 1 |
| • | Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of power. 1 |
| • | Sometimes a man wants to be stupid, if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids. 1 |
| • | People like you to be something, preferably what they are. 1 |
| • | No man really knows about other human beings. The best he can do is to suppose that they are like himself. 1 |
| • | Anything that just costs money is cheap. 1 |
| • | To be alive at all is to have scars. 1 |
| • | Try to understand men. If you understand each other you will be kind to each other. Knowing a man well never leads to hate and almost always leads to love. 1 |
| • | I was born lost and take no pleasure in being found. 1 |
| • | Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen. 1 |
| • | What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness. 1 |
| • | All war is a symptom of man’s failure as a thinking animal. 1 |
| • | It’s so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone. 1 |
| • | And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good. 1 |
| • | There ain’t no sin and there ain’t no virtue. There’s just stuff people do. 1 |
| • | All great and precious things are lonely. 1 |
Funny Quotes
| • | The profession of book-writing makes horse-racing seem like a solid, stable business. 1 |
