Quote

I can't start writing until I have a closing line.

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
Closing
Line
Lines
Start
Writing

More quotes by 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
I am miracle ingredient Z-247. I'm immense. I'm a real, slam-bang, honest-to-goodness, three-fisted humdinger. I'm a bona fide supraman.
Joseph Heller
Image
It is the anonymous they, the enigmatic they who are in charge. Who is they? I don't know. Nobody knows. Not even they themselves.
Joseph Heller
Image
Something did happen to me somewhere that robbed me of confidence and courage and left me with a fear of discovery and change and a positive dread of everything unknown that may occur.
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
There is no disappointment so numbing...as someone no better than you achieving more.
Joseph Heller
Image
Destiny is a good thing to accept when it's going your way. When it isn't, don't call it destiny call it injustice, treachery, or simple bad luck.
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
For war there is always enough. It's peace that's expensive.
Joseph Heller
Image
Yossarian decided to change the subject. Now you're changing the subject. he pointed out diplomatically. I'll bet I can name two things to be miserable about for every one you can name to be thankful for.
Joseph Heller
Image
How much reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who finds it necessary to include such phenomena as phlegm and tooth decay in His divine system of Creation? What in the world was running through that warped, evil, scatological mind of His when He robbed old people of the power to control their bowel movements?
Joseph Heller
Image
He was sick with lust and mesmerized with regret
Joseph Heller
Image
The body stores the trauma of our lives in muscular rigidity, thereby keeping us stuck in the past. When we release the tension in the body and align ourselves with gravity, we take a new stand in life. This allows us to be at ease with ourselves and in harmony in our relationship to others and to our planet.
Joseph Heller
Image
Death to all modifiers, he declared one day, and out of every letter that passed through his hands went every adverb and every adjective.
Joseph Heller
Image
Gold was not altogether certain what, anatomically, a gorge was, but he knew that his was rising.
Joseph Heller
Image
Rise above principal and do what's right.
Joseph Heller
Image
What do you do when it rains? The captain answered frankly. I get wet.
Joseph Heller
Image
Let's take a drive into the middle of nowhere with a packet of Marlboro lights and talk about our lives.
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
If character is destiny, the good are damned.
Joseph Heller