John Steinbeck
Quotes
Only God sees the sparrow fall, but even God doesn’t do anything about it.
Failure is a state of mind. It’s like one of those sand traps an ant lion digs. You keep sliding back. Takes one hell of a jump to get out of it.
When two people meet, each one is changed by the other so you've got two new people. Maybe that means — hell, it's complicated.
We can shoot rockets into space but we can’t cure anger or discontent.
For the most part people are not curious except about themselves.
Are cats strange animals or do they so resemble us that we find them curious as we do monkeys?
The incident seemed to prove to me that intentions, good or bad, are not enough.
It is odd how a man believes he can think better in a special place. I have such a place, have always had it, but I know it isn't thinking I do there, but feeling and experiencing and remembering. It's a safety place — everyone must have one, although I never heard a man tell of it.
They successfully combined piracy and puritanism, which aren't so unlike when you come right down to it. Both had a strong dislike for opposition and both had a roving eye for other people's property.
A man who tells secrets or stories must think of who is hearing or reading, for a story has as many versions as it has readers.
Even if teen-age children aren't making a sound, it's quieter when they're gone. They put a boiling in the air around them. As they left, the whole house seemed to sigh and settle. No wonder poltergeists infest only houses with adolescent children.
You know most people live ninety per cent in the past, seven per cent in the present, and that only leaves them three per cent for the future.
