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I Think If You Don't Really Like A Girl, You Shouldn't Horse Around With Her At All, And If You Do Like Her, Then You're Supposed To Like Her Face, And If You Like Her Face, You Ought To Be Careful About Doing Crumby Stuff To It, Like Squirting Water All Over It. It's Really Too Bad That So Much Crumby Stuff Is A Lot Of Fun Sometimes.

-J. D. Salinger

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I Think If You

J. D. Salinger

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I Think If You Don't Really Like A Girl, You Shouldn't Horse Around With Her At All, And If You Do Like Her, Then You're Supposed To Like Her Face, And If You Like Her Face, You Ought To Be Careful About Doing Crumby Stuff To It, Like Squirting Water All Over It. It's Really Too Bad That So Much Crumby Stuff Is A Lot Of Fun Sometimes.

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She Really Started To Cry, And The Next Thing I Knew, I Was Kissing Her All Over - Anywhere - Her Eyes, Her Nose, Her Forehead, Her Eyebrows, And All, Her Ears - Her Whole Face Except Her Mouth And All.

I Don't Know About Bores. Maybe You Shouldn't Feel Too Sorry If You See Some Swell Girl Getting Married To Them. They Don't Hurt Anybody Most Of Them, And Maybe They're All Terrific Whistlers Or Something. Who The Hell Knows? Not Me.

I'm Sick Of Not Having The Courage To Be An Absolute Nobody. I'm Sick Of Myself And Everybody Else That Wants To Make Some Kind Of A Splash.

That's The Whole Trouble. You Can't Ever Find A Place That's Nice And Peaceful, Because There Isn't Any.

But You Can't Always Tell - With Somebody's Mother, I Mean. Mothers Are All Slightly Insane.

If You Sat Around There Long Enough And Heard All The Phonies Applauding And All, You Got To Hate Everybody In The World, I Swear You Did.

You Don't Have To Think Too Hard When You Talk To Teachers.

Just Go To Bed, Now. Quickly. Quickly And Slowly.

Oh, It's Lovely To See You!' Franny Said As The Cab Moved Off. 'i've Missed You.' The Words Were No Sooner Out Than She Realized That She Didn't Mean Them At All.

Why's It So Sunny?" She Repeated. Zooey Observed Her Rather Narrowly. "i Bring The Sun Wherever I Go, Buddy," He Said.

It Always Smelled Like It Was Raining Outside, Even If It Wasn't, And You Were In The Only Nice, Dry, Cosy Place In The World.

The Goddam Movies. They Can Ruin You. I'm Not Kidding

Don't Hate Me Because I Can't Remember Some Person Immediately. Especially When They Look Like Everybody Else, And Talk And Dress And Act Like Everybody Else.

It Was The Last Game Of The Year And You Were Supposed To Commit Suicide Or Something If Old Pencey Didn't Win.

For A Psychoanalyst To Be Any Good... He'd Have To Believe That It Was Through The Grace Of God That He'd Been Inspired To Study Psychoanalysis In The First Place.

I Mean It's Very Hard To Meditate And Live A Spiritual Life In America. People Think You're A Freak If You Try To.

If You Have Something To Offer, Someone Will Learn Something From You. It's A Beautiful Reciprocal Arrangement. And It Isn't Education. It's History. It's Poetry.

The Rest, With Very Little Exaggeration, Was Books. Meant-to-be-picked-up Books. Permanently-left-behind Books. Uncertain-what-to-do-with Books. But Books, Books. Tall Cases Lined Three Walls Of The Room, Filled To And Beyond Capacity. The Overflow Had Been Piled In Stacks On The Floor. There Was Little Space Left For Walking, And None Whatever For Pacing.

Exaggeration Is

But Doctors Talk About Cells As If They Had Such Unlimited Importance All By Themselves. As If They Didn't Really Belong To The Person That Has Them." Teddy Brushed Back His Hair From His Forehead With One Hand. "i Grew My Own Body," He Said. "nobody Else Did It For Me. So If I Grew It, I Must Have Known How To Grow It. Unconsciously, At Least. I May Have Lost The Conscious Knowledge Of How To Grow It Sometime In The Last Few Hundred Thousand Years, But The Knowledge Is Still There, Because—obviously—i've Used It.

Are All Your Stars Shining?

I Feel Overwhelmingly Grateful To Them, But I Don't Know What To Do With Their Invisible Gifts.

I Have A Feeling That You're Riding For Some Kind Of A Terrible, Terrible Fall. But I Don't Honestly Know What Kind.... It May Be The Kind Where, At The Age Of Thirty, You Sit In Some Bar Hating Everybody Who Comes In Looking As If He Might Have Played Football In College. Then Again, You May Pick Up Just Enough Education To Hate People Who Say, 'it's A Secret Between He And I.' Or You May End Up In Some Business Office, Throwing Paper Clips At The Nearest Stenographer. I Just Don't Know.

I Hate Actors. They Never Act Like People. They Just Think They Do

He Once Told Allie And I That If He'd Had To Shoot Anybody, He Wouldn't've Known Which Direction To Shoot In. He Said The Army Was Practically As Full Of Bastards As The Nazis Were.

You Asked Me How To Get Out Of The Finite Dimensions When I Feel Like It. I Certainly Don't Use Logic When I Do It. Logic's The First Thing You Have To Get Rid Of.

I Love You To Pieces, Distraction, Etc.

It's One Of Those Places That Are Supposed To Be Very Sophisticated And All, And The Phonies Are Coming In The Window.

How Old Are You? I Asked Her. "old Enough To Know Better." She Said.

If Only You’d Remember Before Ever You Sit Down To Write That You’ve Been A Reader Long Before You Were Ever A Writer. You Simply Fix That Fact In Your Mind, Then Sit Very Still And Ask Yourself, As A Reader, What Piece Of Writing In All The World Buddy Glass Would Most Want To Read If He Had His Heart’s Choice. The Next Step Is Terrible, But So Simple I Can Hardly Believe It As I Write It. You Just Sit Down Shamelessly And Write The Thing Yourself. I Won’t Even Underline That. It’s Too Important To Be Underlined.

That's The Terrible Part. I Swear To God I'm A Madman.

The Sentence Im Reading Is Terrific.

I Am A Kind Of Paranoid In Reverse. I Suspect People Of Plotting To Make Me Happy.

Happiness Is A Solid And Joy Is A Liquid.

Anyway, I'm Sort Of Glad They've Got The Atomic Bomb Invented. If There's Ever Another War, I'm Going To Sit Right The Hell On Top Of It. I'll Volunteer For It, I Swear To God I Will.

I Thought What I'd Do Was I'd Pretend I Was One Of Those Deaf-mutes.

People Always Clap For The Wrong Reasons.

Rewards And Recognition

Girls. You Never Know What They're Going To Think.

How That Name Comes Up. Mixing Memory And Desire

I’ll Read My Books And I’ll Drink Coffee And I’ll Listen To Music, And I’ll Bolt The Door.

This Is A People Shooting Hat," I Said. "i Shoot People In This Hat.

This Fall I Think You're Riding For—it's A Special Kind Of Fall, A Horrible Kind. The Man Falling Isn't Permitted To Feel Or Hear Himself Hit Bottom. He Just Keeps Falling And Falling. The Whole Arrangement's Designed For Men Who, At Some Time Or Other In Their Lives, Were Looking For Something Their Own Environment Couldn't Supply Them With. Or They Thought Their Own Environment Couldn't Supply Them With. So They Gave Up Looking. They Gave It Up Before They Ever Really Even Got Started.

Bessie: 'why Don't You Get Married?' Zooey: 'i Like Riding In Trains Too Much. You Never Get To Sit Next To The Window Anymore When You're Married.

I'm Not Afraid To Compete. It's Just The Opposite. Don't You See That? I'm Afraid I Will Compete - That's What Scares Me.

We Are, All Four Of Us, Blood Relatives, And We Speak A Kind Of Esoteric, Family Language, A Sort Of Semantic Geometry In Which The Shortest Distance Between Any Two Points Is A Fullish Circle.

I Privately Say To You, Old Friend... Please Accept From Me This Unpretentious Bouquet Of Early-blooming Parentheses: (((()))).

Get Your Dirty Stinking Moron Knees Off My Chest.

He Was The Tallest, Thinnest, Weariest Boy I Had Ever Seen In My Life. He Was Brilliant. He Had Gorgeous Brown Eyes, And He Had Only Two Suits. He Was Completely Unhappy, And I Didn't Know Why.

The World Is Full Of Actors Pretending To Be Human

She Wrote To Him Fairly Regularly, From A Paradise Of Triple Exclamation Points And Inaccurate Observations.

Exclamation Points

Boy, When You're Dead, They Really Fix You Up. I Hope To Hell When I Do Die Somebody Has Sense Enough To Just Dump Me In The River Or Something. Anything Except Sticking Me In A Goddam Cemetery. People Coming And Putting A Bunch Of Flowers On Your Stomach On Sunday, And All That Crap. Who Wants Flowers When You're Dead?

I’m Not Going To Bed After All. Somebody Around Here Hath Murdered Sleep. Good For Him.

She's Quite Skinny, Like Me, But Nice Skinny. Roller-skate Skinny. I Watched Her Once From The Window When She Was Crossing Over Fifth Avenue To Go To The Park, And That's What She Is, Roller-skate Skinny. You'd Like Her.

I Held Hands With Her All The Time...that Doesn't Sound Like Much, I Realize, But She Was Terrific To Hold Hands With. Most Girls If You Hold Hands With Them, Their Goddam Hand Dies On You, Or Else They Think They Have To Keep Moving Their Hand All The Time, As If They Were Afraid They'd Bore You Or Something.

If I Were God, I Certainly Wouldn't Want People To Love Me Sentimentally. It's Too Unreliable.

That's The Whole Trouble. When You're Feeling Very Depressed, You Can't Even Think.

I Have Scars On My Hands From Touching Certain People...certain Heads, Certain Colours And Textures Of Human Hair Leave Permanent Marks On Me. Other Things, Too. Charlotte Once Ran Away From Me, Outside The Studio, And I Grabbed Her Dress To Stop Her, To Keep Her Near Me. A Yellow Cotton Dress I Loved Because It Was Too Long For Her. I Still Have A Lemon-yellow Mark On The Palm Of My Right Hand. Oh God, If I'm Anything By A Clinical Name, I'm A Kind Of Paranoiac In Reverse. I Suspect People Of Plotting To Make Me Happy.

It Was A Very Stupid Thing To Do, I'll Admit, But I Hardly Didn't Even Know I Was Doing It.

Poets Are Always Taking The Weather So Personally. They're Always Sticking Their Emotions In Things That Have No Emotions.

You Can't Argue With Someone Who Believes, Or Just Passionately Suspects, That The Poet's Function Is Not To Write What He Must Write But, Rather, To Write What He Would Write If His Life Depended On His Taking Responsibility For Writing What He Must In A Style Designed To Shut Out As Few Of His Old Librarians As Humanly Possible.

Then Again You May Pick Up Just Enough Education To Hate People Who Say, 'it's A Secret Between He And I.'

I Have Scars On My Hands From Touching Certain People.

His Icebergs Are Strange Monuments With A Symbol Embodied In Their Form And Their Colours. They Do Not Freeze You When You Look At Them, For They Are Not Of Ice, They Are What Lawren Harris Feels And Thinks After He Has Contemplated Them

You Can't Exist In This World With Such Strong Likes And Dislikes.

Likes And Dislikes

I Told Her I Loved Her And All. It Was A Lie, Of Course, But The Thing Is, I Meant It When I Said It. I'm Crazy. I Swear To God I Am.

I Suspect That Money Is A Far Greater Distraction For The Artist Than Hunger.

God, How I Still Love Private Readers. It’s What We All Used To Be.

And I Have One Of Those Very Loud, Stupid Laughs. I Mean If I Ever Sat Behind Myself In A Movie Or Something, I'd Probably Lean Over And Tell Myself To Please Shut Up.

Sex Is Something I Really Don't Understand Too Hot. You Never Know Where The Hell You Are. I Keep Making Up These Sex Rules For Myself, And Then I Break Them Right Away. Last Year I Made A Rule That I Was Going To Quit Horsing Around With Girls That, Deep Down, Gave Me A Pain In The Ass. I Broke It, Though, The Same Week I Made It - The Same Night, As A Matter Of Fact.

It Happens To Be One Of Those Days When I See Everybody In The Family, Including Myself, Through The Wrong End Of A Telescope.

One Of Those Days

After I Go Out This Door, I May Only Exist In The Minds Of All My Acquaintances…i May Be An Orange Peel.

I Knew It Wasn't Too Important, But It Made Me Sad Anyway.

I Just Never Felt So Fantastically Rocky In My Entire Life.

I Don't Even Like Old Cars. I'd Rather Have A Goddam Horse. A Horse Is At Least Human, For God's Sake.

I Ignored The Flashes Of Lightning All Around Me. They Either Had Your Number On Them Or They Didn't.

Grand. There's A Word I Really Hate. It's A Phony. I Could Puke Every Time I Hear It.

She Was Wearing A Canary-yellow Two-piece Bathing Suit, One Piece Of Which She Would Not Actually Be Needing For Another Nine Or Ten Years.

Some Game. If You Get On The Side Where All The Hot-shots Are, Then It's A Game, All Right - I'll Admit That. But If You Get On The Other Side, Where There Aren't Any Hot-shots, Then What's A Game About It? Nothing. No Game.

One Day A Long Time From Now You'll Cease To Care Anymore Whom You Please Or What Anybody Has To Say About You. That's When You'll Finally Produce The Work You're Capable Of.

Tilting His Head Back He Slowly Released An Enormous Quantity Of Smoke From His Mouth And Drew It Up Through His Nostrils. He Continued To Smoke In This "french-inhale" Style. Very Probably, It Was Not Part Of The Sofa Vaudeville Of A Showoff But, Rather, The Private, Exposed Achievement Of A Young Man Who, At One Time Or Another, Might Have Tried Shaving Himself Left-handed.

Enormous Quantities

I Was About Half In Love With Her By The Time We Sat Down. That's The Thing About Girls. Every Time They Do Something Pretty... You Fall Half In Love With Them, And Then You Never Know Where The Hell You Are.

I Can’t Explain What I Mean. And Even If I Could, I’m Not Sure I’d Feel Like It.

She Was There, And She Was The Whole City, And That’s That.

She Was Not One For Emptying Her Face Of Expression.

The Mark Of The Immature Man Is That He Wants To Die Nobly For A Cause, While The Mark Of The Mature Man Is That He Wants To Live Humbly For One.

Hell Is The Suffering Of Being Unable To Love.

Inability To Love

I Don't Really Deeply Feel That Anyone Needs An Airtight Reason For Quoting From The Works Of Writers He Loves, But It's Always Nice, I'll Grant You, If He Has One.

They Love Their Reasons For Loving Us Almost As Much As They Love Us, And Most Of The Time More. It's Not So Good, That Way.

She Wasn't Doing A Thing That I Could See, Except Standing There Leaning On The Balcony Railing, Holding The Universe Together.

You Can Hit My Father Over The Head With A Chair And He Won't Wake Up, But My Mother, All You Have To Do To My Mother Is Cough Somewhere In Siberia And She'll Hear You.

Each Of His Phrases Was Rather Like A Little Ancient Island, Inundated By A Miniature Sea Of Whiskey.

Life Is A Gift Horse In My Opinion.

Oh, This Happiness Is Strong Stuff.

I Mean They Don't Seem Able To Love Us Just The Way We Are. They Don't Seem Able To Love Us Unless They Can Keep Changing Us A Little Bit. They Love Their Reasons For Loving Us Almost As Much As They Love Us, And Most Of The Time More.

An Artist's Only Concern Is To Shoot For Some Kind Of Perfection, And On His Own Terms, Not Anyone Else's.

You're Lucky If You Get Time To Sneeze In This Goddam Phenomenal World.

Among Other Things, You'll Find That You're Not The First One Who Was Ever Confused And Frightened And Even Sickened By Human Behavior.

It's So Silly. All You Do Is Get The Heck Out Of Your Body When You Die. My Gosh, Everybody's Done It Thousands Of Times. Just Because They Don't Remember, It Doesn't Mean They Haven't Done It.

She Was A Girl Who For A Ringing Phone Dropped Exactly Nothing. She Looked As If Her Phone Had Been Ringing Continually Ever Since She Had Reached Puberty.

Who Wants Flowers When Youre Dead? Nobody.

I'm The Most Terrific Liar You Ever Saw In Your Life.

Give Me An Honest Con Man Any Day.

Yet A Real Artist, I've Noticed, Will Survive Anything. (even Praise, I Happily Suspect.)

It Is My Rather Subversive Opinion That A Writer's Feelings Of Anonymity-obscurity Are The Second Most Valuable Property On Loan To Him During His Working Years.

The Great Gatsby' [...] Was My 'tom Sawyer' When I Was Twelve [....]

But I'm Crazy. I Swear To God I Am.

Do It For The Fat Lady!

I'm Up To My Ears In Unwritten Words.

I Don't Suppose A Writing Man Ever Really Gets Rid Of His Old Crocus-yellow Neckties. Sooner Or Later, I Think, They Show Up In His Prose, And There Isn't A Hell Of A Lot He Can Do About It.

You’d Better Get Busy, Though, Buddy. The Goddam Sands Run Out On You Every Time You Turn Around. I Know What I’m Talking About. You’re Lucky If You Get Time To Sneeze In This Goddam Phenomenal World.

It Was Just Terrible! And The Worst Part Was, I Knew What A Bore I Was Being, I Knew How I Was Depressing People, Or Even Hurting Their Feelings- But I Just Couldn't Stop! I Just Could Not Stop Picking!

It Was That Kind Of A Crazy Afternoon, Terrifically Cold, And No Sun Out Or Anything, And You Felt Like You Were Disappearing Every Time You Crossed A Road.

Certain Things, They Should Stay The Way They Are. You Ought To Be Able To Stick Them In One Of Those Big Glass Cases And Just Leave Them Alone.

I Drew Laughing, High-breasted Girls Aquaplaning Without A Care In The World, As A Result Of Being Amply Protected Against Such National Evils As Bleeding Gums, Facial Blemishes, Unsightly Hairs, And Faulty Or Inadequate Life Insurance. I Drew Housewives Who, Until They Reached For The Right Soap Flakes, Laid Themselves Wide Open To Straggly Hair, Poor Posture, Unruly Children, Disaffected Husbands, Rough (but Slender) Hands, Untidy (but Enormous) Kitchens.

How Do You Know You're Going To Do Something, Untill You Do It?

I'm Not Afraid To Compete. It's Just The Opposite. Don't You See That? I'm Afraid I Will Compete — That's What Scares Me. That's Why I Quit The Theatre Department. Just Because I'm So Horribly Conditioned To Accept Everybody Else's Values, And Just Because I Like Applause And People To Rave About Me, Doesn't Make It Right. I'm Ashamed Of It. I'm Sick Of It. I'm Sick Of Not Having The Courage To Be An Absolute Nobody. I'm Sick Of Myself And Everybody Else That Wants To Make Some Kind Of A Splash.

I Like To Be Somewhere At Least Where You Can See A Few Girls Around Once In A While, Even If They're Only Scratching Their Arms Or Blowing Their Noses Or Even Just Giggling Or Something.

Life Is A Game, Boy. Life Is A Game That One Plays According To The Rules.

The Color Of His Pallor, However, Was A Curiously Basic White - Unmixed, That Is, With The Greens And Yellows Of Guilt Or Abject Contrition. It Was Very Like The Standard Bloodlessness In The Face Of A Small Boy Who Loves Animals To Distraction, All Animals, And Who Has Just Seen His Favourite, Bunny-loving Sister's Expression As She Opened The Box Containing His Birthday Present To Her - A Freshly Caught Young Cobra, With A Red Ribbon Tied In An Awkward Bow Around Its Neck.

People Never Think Anything Is Anything Really. I'm Getting Goddam Sick Of It.

Make Sure You Marry Someone Who Laughs At The Same Things You Do.

My God, There's Absolutely Nothing Tenth-rate About You, And Yet You're Up To Your Neck At This Minute In Tenth-rate Thinking.

Lane Himself Lit A Cigarette As The Train Pulled In. Then, Like So Many People, Who, Perhaps, Ought To Be Issued Only A Very Probational Pass To Meet Trains, He Tried To Empty His Face Of All Expression That Might Quite Simply, Perhaps Even Beautifully, Reveal How He Felt About The Arriving Person. Franny Was Among The First Of The Girls To Get Off The Train, From A Car At The Far, Northern End Of The Platform. Lane Spotted Her Immediately, And Despite Whatever It Was He Was Trying To Do With His Face, His Arm That Shot Up Into The Air Was The Whole Truth.

I Submit That Zooey's Face Was Close To Being A Wholly Beautiful Face. As Such, It Was Of Course Vulnerable To The Same Variety Of Glibly Undaunted And Usually Specious Evaluations That Any Legitimate Art Object Is. I Think It Just Remains To Be Said That Any One Of A Hundred Everyday Menaces — A Car Accident, A Head Cold, A Lie Before Breakfast — Could Have Disfigured Or Coarsened His Bounteous Good Looks In A Day Or A Second.

That's Something That Annoys The Hell Out Of Me-i Mean If Somebody Says The Coffee's All Ready And It Isn't.

A Confessional Passage Has Probably Never Been Written That Didn't Stink A Little Bit Of The Writer's Pride In Having Given Up His Pride.

If There Is An Amateur Reader Still Left In The World - Or Anybody Who Just Reads And Runs - I Ask Him Or Her, With Untellable Affection And Gratitude, To Split The Dedication Of This Book Four Ways With My Wife And Children.

While I Was Walking I Passed These Two Guys That Were Unloading This Big Christmas Tree Off A Truck. One Guy, Kept Saying To The Other Guy, 'hold The Sonunvabitch Up! Hold It Up, For Chrissake!' It Certainly Was A Gorgeous Way To Talk About A Christmas Tree.

The True Poet Has No Choice Of Material. The Material Plainly Chooses Him, Not He It.

I Was Sixteen Then, And I'm Seventeen Now, And Sometimes I Act Like I'm About Thirteen. Sometimes, I Act A Lot Older Than I Am--i Really Do. But People Never Notice It. People Never Notice Anything.

I Thought The Two Ugly Ones Were Sisters, But They Got Very Insulted When I Asked Them. You Could Tell Neither One Of Them Wanted To Look Like The Other One, And You Couldn't Blame Them, But It Was Very Amusing Anyway.

It Isn't Very Serious, I Have This Tiny Little Tumor On The Brain.

People Are Mostly Hot To Have A Discussion When You're Not.

I Mean Most Girls Are So Dumb And All. After You Neck Them For A While, You Can Really Watch Them Losing Their Brains. You Take A Girl When She Really Gets Passionate, She Just Hasn't Any Brains. -holden Caulfield

Phooey, I Say, On All White-shoe College Boys Who Edit Their Campus Literary Magazines. Give Me An Honest Con Man Any Day.

I Was Surrounded By Jerks. I'm Not Kidding.

I Don't Even Know What I Was Running For—i Guess I Just Felt Like It.

I'm One Of The Little Foxes That Spoil The Grapes.

It's Everybody, I Mean. Everything Everybody Does Is So - I Don't Know - Not Wrong, Or Even Mean, Or Even Stupid Necessarily. But Just So Tiny And Meaningless And - Sad-making. And The Worst Part Is, If You Go Bohemian Or Something Crazy Like That, You're Conforming Just As Much Only In A Different Way.

It's No Fun To Be Yellow. Maybe I'm Not All Yellow. I Don't Know. I Think Maybe I'm Just Partly Yellow And Partly The Type That Doesn't Give Much Of A Damn If They Lose Their Gloves. One Of My Troubles Is, I Never Care Too Much When I Lose Something - It Used To Drive Mother Crazy When I Was A Kid. Some Guys Spend Days Looking For Something They've Lost. I Never Seem To Have Anything That If I Lost It I'd Care Too Much. Maybe That's Why I'm Partly Yellow. It's No Excuse, Though. It Really Isn't. What You Should Be Is Not Yellow At All.

If You Do Something Too Good, Then, After A While, If You Don't Watch It, You Start Showing Off. And Then You're Not As Good Any More.

I Didn't Want Any Degrees If All The Ill-read Literates And Radio Announcers And Pedagogical Dummies I Knew Had Them By The Peck.

If Death Stepped Miraculously Through The Glass And Came In After You, In All Probability You Just Got Up And Went Along With Him, Ferociously But Quietly.

Women Kill Me. They Really Do. I Don't Mean I'm Oversexed Or Anything Like That—although I Am Quite Sexy. I Just Like Them, I Mean. They're Always Leaving Their Goddam Bags Out In The Middle Of The Aisle.

She Worries Over The Way Her Love For Me Comes And Goes, Appears And Disappears. She Doubts Its Reality Simply Because It Isn't As Steadily Pleasurable As A Kitten. God Knows It Is Sad. The Human Voice Conspires To Desecrate Everything On Earth.

It's Not Too Bad When The Sun's Out, But The Sun Only Comes Out When It Feels Like Coming Out.

I Could Happily Lie Down And Die Sometimes.

Real Ugly Girls Have It Tough. I Feel So Sorry For Them Sometimes.

The Connection Was So Bad, And I Couldn’t Talk At All During Most Of The Call. How Terrible It Is When You Say I Love You And The Person At The Other End Shouts Back ‘what?

Sleep Tight, Ya Morons!

Liberate Yourself From My Vice-like Grip!

Don't You Think I Have Sense Enough To Worry About My Motives For Saying The Prayer? That's Exactly What's Bothering Me So. Just Because I'm Choosy About What I Want - In This Case, Enlightenment Or Peace, Instead Or Money Or Prestige Or Game Or Any Of Those Things, Doesn't Mean I'm Not As Egotistical And Self-seeking As Everybody Else. If Anything, I'm More So!

Or You'd Just Passed By One Of Those Puddles In The Street With Gasoline Rainbows In Them. I Mean You'd Be Different In Some Way—i Can't Explain What I Mean. And Even If I Could, I'm Not Sure I'd Feel Like It.

He Seemed Unaware Of The Messiness Of The Arrangement.

I Love To Write And I Assure You I Write Regularly... But I Write For Myself, For My Own Pleasure. And I Want To Be Left Alone To Do It.

I Felt So Lonesome, All Of A Sudden. I Almost Wished I Was Dead.

I Used To Think She Was Quite Intelligent , In My Stupidity. The Reason I Did Was Because She Knew Quite A Lot About The Theater And Plays And Literature And All That Stuff. If Somebody Knows Quite A Lot About All Those Things, It Takes You Quite A While To Find Out Whether They're Really Stupid Or Not.

Nobody Who's Really Using His Ego, His Real Ego, Has Any Time For Any Goddam Hobbies

I Don't Exactly Know What I Mean By That, But I Mean It.

The Fact Is Always Obvious Much Too Late, But The Most Singular Difference Between Happiness And Joy Is That Happiness Is A Solid And Joy A Liquid.

In My Mind, I'm Probably The Biggest Sex Maniac You Ever Saw.

I Was Surrounded By Phonies...they Were Coming In The Goddam Window.

Holden Caulfield

Money Always Ends Up Making You Blue.

But I Do Say That Educated And Scholarly Men, If They’re Brilliant And Creative To Begin With—which, Unfortunately, Is Rarely The Case—tend To Leave Infinitely More Valuable Records Behind Them Than Men Do Who Are Merely Brilliant And Creative. They Tend To Express Themselves More Clearly, And They Usually Have A Passion For Following Their Thoughts Through To The End.

Against My Better Judgment I Feel Certain That Somewhere Very Near Here—the First House Down The Road, Maybe—there's A Good Poet Dying, But Also Somewhere Very Near Here Somebody's Having A Hilarious Pint Of Pus Taken From Her Lovely Young Body, And I Can't Be Running Back And Forth Forever Between Grief And High Delight.

He Said I Was Unequipped To Meet Life Because I Had No Sense Of Humor.

Listen, If You're Not Going To Be A Nun Or Something, You Might As Well Laugh.

The Worst Thing That Being An Artist Could Do To You Would Be That It Would Make You Slightly Unhappy Constantly.

What Really Knocks Me Out Is A Book That, When You're All Done Reading It, You Wish The Author That Wrote It Was A Terrific Friend Of Yours And You Could Call Him Up On The Phone Whenever You Felt Like It. That Doesn't Happen Much, Though.

I’m Just Sick Of Ego, Ego, Ego. My Own And Everybody Else’s. I’m Sick Of Everybody That Wants To Get Somewhere, Do Something Distinguished And All, Be Somebody Interesting. It’s Disgusting.

Ask Her If She Still Keeps All Her Kings In The Back Row.

However Contradictory The Coroner's Report — Whether He Pronounces Consumption Or Loneliness Or Suicide To Be The Cause Of Death — Isn't It Plain How The True Artist-seer Actually Dies? I Say That The True Artist-seer, The Heavenly Fool Who Can And Does Produce Beauty, Is Mainly Dazzled To Death By His Own Scruples, The Blinding Shapes And Colors Of His Own Sacred Human Conscience.

The Cards Are Stacked (quite Properly, I Imagine) Against All Professional Aesthetes, And No Doubt We All Deserve The Dark, Wordy, Academic Deaths We All Sooner Or Later Die.

In Every School I've Gone To, All The Athletic Bastards Stick Together.

You Know Sven? The Man Who Takes Care Of The Gym?' He Asked. He Waited Till He Got A Nod From Nicholson. 'well, If Sven Dreamed Tonight That His Dog Died, He'd Have A Very, Very Bad Night's Sleep, Because He's Very Fond Of That Dog. But When He Woke Up In The Morning, Everything Would Be All Right. He'd Know It Was Only A Dream.' Nicholson Nodded. 'what's The Point Exactly?' The Point Is If His Dog Really Died, It Would Be Exactly The Same Thing. Only He Wouldn't Know It. I Mean He Wouldn't Wake Up Till He Died Himself.

I Kept Picturing All These Little Kids In This Big Field Of Rye... If They're Running And They Don't Look Where They're Going, I Have To Come Out From Somewhere And Catch Them.

Boy, Did He Depress Me! I Don't Mean He Was A Bad Guy- He Wasn't. But You Don't Have To Be Bad Guy To Depress Somebody- You Can Be A Good Guy And Do It.

I Have So Much I Want To Tell You, And Nowhere To Begin.

Where Do The Ducks Go In The Winter?

He Had A Theory, Walt Did, That The Religious Life, And All The Agony That Goes With It, Is Just Something God Sics On People Who Have The Gall To Accuse Him Of Having Created An Ugly World.

You Think Of The Book You'd Most Like To Be Reading, And Then You Sit Down And Shamelessly Write It.

Sex Is Something I Really Don't Understand Too Hot. You Never Know Where The Hell You Are... Sex Is Something I Just Don't Understand. I Swear To God.

You Don't Know How To Talk To People You Don't Like. Don't Love, Really. You Can't Live In The World With Such Strong Likes And Dislikes.

Likes And Dislikes

I Just Hope That One Day - Preferably When We’re Both Blind Drunk - We Can Talk About It.

Take Most People, They Are Crazy About Cars. They Worry If They Get A Little Scratch On Them, They Are Always Talking About Have Many Miles They Get To A Gallon, And If They Get A Brand New Car Already They Start Thinking About Trading It In For One That Is Even Newer. I Do Not Even Like Old Cars. . . . I'd Rather Have A Horse. A Horse Is At Least Human, For God's Sake.

Always, Always, Always Referring Every Goddam Thing That Happens Right Back To Our Lousy Little Egos.

I Prayed For The City To Be Cleared Of People, For The Gift Of Being Alone—a-l-o-n-e: Which Is The One New York Prayer That Rarely Gets Lost Or Delayed In Channels, And In No Time At All Everything I Touched Turned To Solid Loneliness.

They Didn't Act Like People And They Didn't Act Like Actors. It's Hard To Explain. They Acted More Like They Knew They Were Celebrities And All. I Mean They Were Good, But They Were Too Good.

If Somebody At Least Listens It Not Too Bad

All Morons Hate It When You Call Them A Moron.

Keep Me Up Till Five Because All Your Stars Are Out, And For No Other Reason…oh Dare To Do It Buddy! Trust Your Heart. You’re A Deserving Craftsman. It Would Never Betray You. Good Night. I’m Feeling Very Much Over-excited Now, And A Little Dramatic, But I Think I’d Give Almost Anything On Earth To See You Writing A Something, An Anything, A Poem, A Tree, That Was Really And Truly After Your Own Heart.

Her Joke Of A Name Aside, Her General Unprettiness Aside, She Was, In Terms Of Permanently Memorable, Immoderately Perceptive, Small-area Faces, A Stunning And Final Girl.

The Existence Of God, The Why Of Life, Was All That Really Only A Question Of Glands?

Existence Of God

The Room Was Not Impressively Large, Even By Manhattan Apartment-house Standards, But Its Accumulated Furnishings Might Have Lent A Snug Appearance To A Banquet Hall In Valhalla.

Marriage Partners Are To Serve Each Other. Elevate, Help, Teach, Strengthen Each Other, But Above All, Serve. Raise Their Children Honorably, Lovingly And With Detachment. A Child Is A Guest In The House, To Be Loved And Respected - Never Possessed, Since He Belongs To God. How Wonderful, How Sane, How Beautifully Difficult, And Therefore True. The Joy Of Responsibility For The First Time In My Life.

The Catcher In The Rye... That's All I Really Want To Be.

If I Were A Piano Player, I'd Play It In The Goddam Closet.

It's Nice When Somebody Tells You About Their Uncle. Especially When They Start Out Telling You About Their Father's Farm And Then All Of A Sudden Get More Interested In Their Uncle.

I'm Beginning To Feel That No Author Has The Right To Tear His Characters Apart If He Doesn't Know How, Or Feel That He Knows How (poor Sucker) To Put Them Together Again. I'm Tired—my God, So Tired—of Leaving Them All Broken On The Page With Just 'the End' Written Underneath.

Poets Are Always Taking The Weather So Personally.

I Mean How Do You Know What You're Going To Do Till You Do It? The Answer Is, You Don't. I Think I Am, But How Do I Know? I Swear It's A Stupid Question.

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John Paul DeJoria

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