Quote

Good God, what a mess of draggle-tail impulses a man is--and a woman too, I guess.

John Steinbeck

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

John Steinbeck
Age: 66 †
Born: 1902
Born: February 27
Died: 1968
Died: December 20
Author
Novelist
Screenwriter
War Correspondent
Writer
Salinas
California
John Ernst Steinbeck
Jr.
John Ernst Steinbeck
John Ernest Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck Jr
Steinbeck
Tail
Tails
Impulse
Mess
Guess
Woman
Good
Men
Impulses

More quotes by John Steinbeck

Image
If you understand each other you will be kind to each other.
John Steinbeck
Image
Don't you dare take the lazy way. It's too easy to excuse yourself because of your ancestry. Don't let me catch you doing it! Now -- look close at me so you will remember. Whatever you do, it will be you who do.
John Steinbeck
Image
Some people there are who, being grown forget the horrible task of learning to read. It is perhaps the greatest single effort that the human undertakes, and he must do it as a child.
John Steinbeck
Image
You must not forget that a monster is only a variation, and that to a monster the norm is monstrous.
John Steinbeck
Image
Misfortune is a fact of nature acceptable to women, especially when it falls on other women.
John Steinbeck
Image
The camera need not be a cold mechanical device. Like the pen, it is as good as the man who uses it. It can be the extension of mind and heart.
John Steinbeck
Image
There's something desirable about anything you're used to as opposed to something you're not.
John Steinbeck
Image
In writing, habit seems to be a much stronger force than either willpower or inspiration.
John Steinbeck
Image
Free men cannot start a war, but once it is started, they can fight on in defeat. Herd men, followers of a leader, cannot do that, and so it is always the herd men who win battles and the free men who win wars.
John Steinbeck
Image
There are two kinds of people in the world, observers and non-observers.
John Steinbeck
Image
Abandon the idea that you are ever going to finish.
John Steinbeck
Image
She wasn't happy, but then she wasn't unhappy. She wasn't anything. But I don't believe anyone is a nothing. There has to be something inside, if only to keep the skin from collapsing. This vacant eye, listless hand, this damask cheek dusted like a doughnut with plastic powder, had to have a memory or a dream.
John Steinbeck
Image
It seems to me Montana is a great splash of grandeur. The scale is huge but not overpowering. The land is rich with grass and color, and the mountains are the kind I would create if mountains were ever put on my agenda.
John Steinbeck
Image
When you're huntin' somepin you're a hunter, an' you're strong. Can't nobody beat a hunter. But when you get hunted - that's different. Somepin happens to you. You ain't strong: maybe you're fierce, but you ain't strong. - Muley
John Steinbeck
Image
Time is more complex near the sea than in any other place, for in addition to the circling of the sun and the turning of the seasons, the waves beat out the passage of time on the rocks and the tides rise and fall as a great clepsydra.
John Steinbeck
Image
Best thing is to get the words down every day. And it is time to start now.
John Steinbeck
Image
And finally comes culture, which is entertainment, relaxation, transport out of the pain of living.
John Steinbeck
Image
For there are two possible reactions to social ostracism - either a man emerges determined to be better, purer, and kindlier or he goes bad, challenges the world and does even worse things. The last is by far the commonest reaction to stigma.
John Steinbeck
Image
I should have known I am the rain. I am the land and I am the rain. The grass will grow out of me in a little while.
John Steinbeck
Image
The discipline of the written word punishes both stupidity and dishonesty.
John Steinbeck