Quote

There's no disgrace in failing, lad, Though friends and foes deride In fact, a failure's not so bad As never having tried.

Ken Kesey

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Ken Kesey
Age: 66 †
Born: 1935
Born: September 17
Died: 2001
Died: November 10
Author
Essayist
Novelist
Writer
La Junta
Colorado
Kenneth Kesey
Kenneth Elton Kesey
Ken Elton Kesey
Ken E. Kesey
O. U. Levon
Failure
Failing
Though
Deride
Friends
Foes
Fact
Lad
Facts
Foe
Never
Disgrace
Tried

More quotes by Ken Kesey

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Mr. Bibbit, you might warn this Mr. Harding that I'm so crazy I admit to voting for Eisenhower. Bibbit! You tell Mr. McMurphy I'm so crazy I voted for Eisenhower twice! And you tell Mr. Harding right back — he puts both hands on the table and leans down, his voice getting low — that I'm so crazy I plan to vote for Eisenhower again this November.
Ken Kesey
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But, gee, the other nurse says, what on earth would MAKE a man want to do something like disrupt the ward for, Miss Ratched? What possible motive...?You seem to forget, MISS Flinn, that this is an institution for the insane.
Ken Kesey
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That ain't me, that ain't my face. It wasn't even me when I was trying to be that face. I wasn't even really me them I was just being the way I looked, the way people wanted.
Ken Kesey
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I was raised a Christian and was a stone-faced acid head.
Ken Kesey
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The dead's dead ... get 'em in the ground and look to the live ones.
Ken Kesey
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You've got to get out and pray to the sky to appreciate the sunshine otherwise you're just a lizard standing there with the sun shining on you.
Ken Kesey
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He Who Marches Out Of Step Hears Another Drum
Ken Kesey
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What can you pay for the way a man lives? What can you pay for what a man is?
Ken Kesey
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I had to keep on acting deaf if i wanted to hear at all.
Ken Kesey
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Man, when you lose your laugh you lose your footing.
Ken Kesey
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The frontiers we broke into in the '60s are still largely unexplored.
Ken Kesey
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People think love is an emotion. Love is good sense.
Ken Kesey
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Then - as he was talking - a set of tail-lights going past lit up McMurphy's face, and the windshield reflected an expression that was allowed only because he figured it'd be too dark for anybody in the car to see, dreadfully tired and strained and frantic, like there wasn't enough time left for something he had to do.
Ken Kesey
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You’re just a young kid. What are you doin’ here? You oughta be out in a convertible, why… bird-doggin’ chicks and bangin’ beaver. What are ya doin’ here, for Christ’s sake? What’s funny about that? Jesus, I mean, you guys do nothin’ but complain about how you can’t stand it in this place here and then you haven’t got the guts just to walk out!
Ken Kesey
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If this glorious birth to death hassle is the only hassle we are ever to have ..if our grand exhilarating fight of life is such a tragically short little scrap anyway,compared to the eons of rounds before and after-then why should one want to relinquish even a few precious seconds of it?
Ken Kesey
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Loved. You can't use it in the past tense. Death does not stop that love at all.
Ken Kesey
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I felt like you can write forever, but you have a short time to raise a family. And I think a family is a lot more important than writing.
Ken Kesey
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She asked if we were calm enough for her to take off the cuffs, and McMurphy nodded. He had slumped over with his head hung and his elbows between his knees and looked completely exhausted--it hadn't occurred to me that it was just as hard for him to stand straight as it was for me.
Ken Kesey
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This world… belongs to the strong, my friend! The ritual of our existence is based on the strong getting stronger by devouring the weak.
Ken Kesey
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Anti-drug fanatics and cops are the criminals - it's like McCarthyism. They need someone to dislike to distract the public from the really important problems.
Ken Kesey