Quote

Every writer I know has trouble writing.

Joseph Heller

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Joseph Heller
Age: 76 †
Born: 1923
Born: May 1
Died: 1999
Died: December 10
Autobiographer
Journalist
Novelist
Playwright
Prosaist
Screenwriter
Writer
New York City
New York
Writing
Every
Writer
Trouble

More quotes by Joseph Heller

Image
The laws of nature are only as immutable as the minds which promote them. Ignorance of the law is 9/10ths of the law. Just because you aren't paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you.
Joseph Heller
Image
History was a trash bag of random coincidences torn open in a wind. Surely, Watt with his steam engine, Faraday with his electric motor, and Edison with his incandescent light bulb did not have it as their goal to contribute to a fuel shortage some day that would place their countries at the mercy of Arab oil.
Joseph Heller
Image
What is a country? A country is a piece of land surrounded on all sides by boundaries, usually unnatural. Englishmen are dying for England, Americans are dying for America, Germans are dying for Germany, Russians are dying for Russia. There are now fifty or sixty countries fighting in this war. Surely so many countries can't all be worth dying for.
Joseph Heller
Image
A man's head is his castle.
Joseph Heller
Image
Under Colonel Korn's rule, the only people permitted to ask questions were those who never did.
Joseph Heller
Image
I'll tell you what justice is. Justice is a knee in the gut from the floor on the chin at night sneaky with a knife brought up down on the magazine of a battleship sandbagged underhanded in the dark without a word of warning
Joseph Heller
Image
Well, he died. You don't get any older than that.
Joseph Heller
Image
He had decided to live forever or die in the attempt.
Joseph Heller
Image
I want to keep my dreams, even bad ones, because without them, I might have nothing all night long.
Joseph Heller
Image
Maybe a long life does have to be filled with many unpleasant conditions if it's to seem long. But in that event, who wants one?
Joseph Heller
Image
For war there is always enough. It's peace that's expensive.
Joseph Heller
Image
Everybody is as unstable as water.
Joseph Heller
Image
Rise above principal and do what's right.
Joseph Heller
Image
I had examined myself pretty thoroughly and discovered that I was unfit for military service.
Joseph Heller
Image
I could not write about a subject sacred to me because I would be too flippant. Fortunately, there are no subjects sacred to me.
Joseph Heller
Image
Gold was not altogether certain what, anatomically, a gorge was, but he knew that his was rising.
Joseph Heller
Image
There's a rule saying I have to ground anyone who's crazy ... There's a catch. Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn't really crazy.
Joseph Heller
Image
It's a wise person, I guess, who knows he's dumb, and an honest person who knows he's a liar. And it's a dumb person, I guess, whose convinced he's wise...-Bob Slocum
Joseph Heller
Image
The night was full of horrors, and he thought he knew how Christ must have felt as he walked through the world, like a psychiatrist through a ward full of nuts.
Joseph Heller
Image
Only Hungry Joe had something better to do each time he finished his missions. He had screaming nightmares and won fist fights with Huple's cat.
Joseph Heller