Quotes from John Steinbeck

A fallow field is a sin.

It is a nice thing to be working and believing in my work again. I hope I can keep the drive. I only feel whole and well when it is this way.

And he didn't get tired or sleepy, for the beauty burned in him like fire.

No one wants advice - only corroboration.

To finish is sadness to a writer — a little death. He puts the last word down and it is done. But it isn't really done. The story goes on and leaves the writer behind, for no story is ever done.

Well, every little boy thinks he invented sin. Virtue we think we learn, because we are told about it. But sin is our own designing.

Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do...Try to be better than yourself.

The people say that the two seemed to be removed from human experience; that they had gone through pain and had come out on the other side.

Failure is a state of mind. It's like one of those sand traps an ant lion digs. You keep sliding back. Takes one hell of a jump to get out of it.

The people in flight from the terror behind-strange things happen to them, some bitterly cruel and some so beautiful that the faith is refired forever.

Abandon the idea that you are ever going to finish. Lose track of the 400 pages and write just one page for each day, it helps. Then when it gets finished you are always surprised. - John Steinbeck from the Fall 1975 issue of The Paris Review

A sad soul can kill you quicker, far quicker, than a germ.

A kind of light spread out from her. And everything changed color. And the world opened out. And a day was good to awaken to. And there were no limits to anything. And the people of the world were good and handsome. And I was not afraid any more.

No man really knows about other human beings. The best he can do is to suppose that they are like himself.

People like you to be something, preferably what they are.

A man so painfully in love is capable of self-torture beyond belief.

It would be absurd if we did not understand both angels and devils, since we invented them.

Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of power.

But I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed - because 'Thou mayest.

If you're in trouble, or hurt or need - go to the poor people. They're the only ones that'll help - the only ones.

A guy needs somebody?to be near him. A guy goes nuts if he ain't got nobody. Don't make no difference who the guy is, long's he's with you. I tell ya, I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an' he gets sick.

I shall revenge myself in the cruelest way you can imagine. I shall forget it.

It was her habit to build up laughter out of inadequate materials.

Don't worry about losing. If it is right, it happens - The main thing is not to hurry. Nothing good gets away.