The sale of souls to gain the whole world is completely voluntary and almost unanimous...but not quite.
The clouds appeared and went away, and in a while they did not try anymore.
The ants were busy on the ground, big black ones with shiny bodies and the little dusty quick ants. Kino watched with the detachment of God while a dusty ant frantically tried to escape the sand trap...
The Word is symbol of delight which sucks up men and scenes, trees, plants, factories, and Pekinese. Then the Thing becomes the Word and the back to Thing again, but warped and woven into a fantastic...
Sure I got sins. Ever'body got sins. A sin is somepin you ain't sure about. Them people that's sure about ever'thing an' ain't got no sin-- well, with that kind a son-of-a-bitch, if I was God I'd kick...
She wasn't happy, but then she wasn't unhappy. She wasn't anything. But I don't believe anyone is a nothing. There has to be something inside, if only to keep the skin from collapsing. This vacant eye...
Once Ed said to me, For a very long time I didn't like myself. It was not said in self-pity but simply as an unfortunate fact. It was a very difficult time, he said, and very painful. I did not like m...
Now discontent nibbled at him - not painfully, but constantly. Where does discontent start? You are warm enough, but you shiver. You are fed, yet hunger gnaws you. You have been loved, but your yearni...
My wife married a man; I saw no reason why she should inherit a baby...I am very fortunate in having a wife who likes being a woman, which means that she likes men, not elderly babies.
Men who have created new fruits in the world cannot create a system whereby those fruits may be eaten.
Maybe it's true that we are all descended from the restless, the nervous, the criminals, the arguers and brawlers, but also the brave and independent and generous. If our ancestors had not been that,...
Literature was not promulgated by a pale and emasculated critical priesthood singing their litanies in empty churches - nor is it a game for the cloistered elect, the tinhorn mendicants of low calorie...
Lennie begged, Le's do it now. Le's get that place now. Sure right now. I gotta. We gotta.
Lee put his arm around the broad shoulders to comfort him. You're growing up. Maybe that's it, he said softly. Sometimes I think the world tests us most sharply then, and we turn inward and watch ours...
I'll tell ya one thing -- the jail house is jus' a kind a way a drivin' a guy slowly nuts. See? An' they go nuts, an' you see 'em an' hear 'em, an' pretty soon you don' know if you're nuts or not. Whe...
I was born lost and take no pleasure in being found.
I know a little bit about a great many things and not enough about any one to make a living in these times.
I can’t tell you how to live your life, Samuel said, although I do be telling you how to live it. I know that it might be better for you to come out from under your might-have-beens, into the winds of...
I can still tend the rabbits, George? I didn't mean no harm, George.
He held the apple box against his chest. And then he leaned over and set the box in the stream and steadied it with his hand. He said fiercely, Go down an' tell 'em. Go down in the street an' rot an'...