Quote

Writing to me is a deeply personal, even a secret function and when the product I turned loose it is cut off from me and I have no sense of its being mine. Consequently criticism doesn't mean anything to me. As a disciplinary matter, it is too late.

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
Even
Personal
Criticism
Secret
Turned
Sense
Mines
Doesn
Mine
Disciplinary
Anything
Function
Consequently
Matter
Products
Loose
Mean
Cutting
Product
Writing
Late
Deeply

More quotes by John Steinbeck

Image
it was her habit to build up laughter out of inadequate materials.
John Steinbeck
Image
A Texan outside of Texas is a foreigner.
John Steinbeck
Image
Don't you love Jesus?' Well, I thought an' I thought an' finally I says, 'No, I don't know nobody name' Jesus. I know a bunch of stories, but I only love people.
John Steinbeck
Image
At about 10 o'clock in the morning the sun threw a bright dust-laden bar through one of the side windows and in and out of the beam flies shot like rushing stars.
John Steinbeck
Image
I have noticed that there is no dissatisfaction like that of the rich. Feed a man, clothe him, put him in a good house, and he will die of despair.
John Steinbeck
Image
You know how advice is. You only want it if it agrees with what you wanted to do anyway.
John Steinbeck
Image
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.
John Steinbeck
Image
The bank - the monster has to have profits all the time. It can't wait. It'll die. No, taxes go on. When the monster stops growing, it dies. It can't stay one size.
John Steinbeck
Image
There are people who will say that this whole account is a lie, but a thing isn't necessarily a lie even if it didn't necessarily happen.
John Steinbeck
Image
Just like heaven. Ever’body wants a little piece of lan’. I read plenty of books out here. Nobody never gets to heaven, and nobody gets no land. It’s just in their head. They’re all the time talkin’ about it, but it’s jus’ in their head.
John Steinbeck
Image
Abandon the idea that you are ever going to finish.
John Steinbeck
Image
Let's say that when I was a little baby, and all my bones soft and malleable, I was put in a small Episcopal cruciform box and so took my shape. Then, when I broke out of the box, the way a baby chick escapes an egg, is it strange that I had the shape of a cross? Have you ever noticed that chickens are roughly egg-shaped?
John Steinbeck
Image
Thou mayest rule over sin.
John Steinbeck
Image
“Do you take pride in your hurt?” Samuel asked. “Does it make you seem large and tragic?” “I don't know.” “Well, think about it. Maybe you're playing a part on a great stage with only yourself as audience.”
John Steinbeck
Image
Maybe ever'body in the whole damn world is scared of each other.
John Steinbeck
Image
The last clear definite function of men—muscles aching to work, minds aching to create beyond the single need—this is man.
John Steinbeck
Image
It would be good to live in a perpetual state of leave-taking, never to go nor to stay, but to remain suspended in that golden emotion of love and longing to be loved without satiety.
John Steinbeck
Image
I have named the destroyers of nations: comfort, plenty, and security - out of which grow a bored and slothful cynicism, in which rebellion against the world as it is, and myself as I am, are submerged in listless self-satisfaction.
John Steinbeck
Image
Sometimes a man wants to be stupid if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids.
John Steinbeck
Image
...no gift will ever buy back a man's love when you have removed his self-love.
John Steinbeck