It was not the thought that I was so unloved that froze me. I had taught myself to do without love.
It was not the thought that God was cruel that froze me. I had taught myself never to expect anything from Him.
What froze me was the fact that I had absolutely no reason to move in any direction. What had made me move through so many dead and pointless years was curiosity.
Now even that had flickered out.
How long I stood frozen there, I cannot say. If I was ever going to move again, someone else was going to have to furnish the reason for moving.
Somebody did.
A policeman watched me for a while, and then he came over to me, and he said, "You alright?"
Yes," I said.
You've been standing here a long time," he said.
I know," I said.
You waiting for somebody?" he said.
No," I said.
Better move on, don't you think?" he said.
Yes, sir," I said.
And I moved on.


Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

  Email Quote to Friends   Link to Quote   Create Short URL  Publish Text About This Quote   Share on Facebook, Twitter, and more
  See Recommended Quotes For You

Related

I froze. It was not guilt that froze me. I had taught myself never to feel guilt. It was not a ghast...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
How would you like it if I said to you, 'It kills me to say this, but you're actually a tiny bit bea...
MELINA MARCHETTA
Are you?" I said. "Gay, I mean?"

-

I hoped he wasn't offended by my asking, b...
BRENT HARTINGER
Jem shook his head. "You bit de Quincey" he said. "You fool. He's a VAMPIRE"

"I had no ch...
CASSANDRA CLARE
I lied," I said. ...
"I know it," he said.
"Then do something about it. Do anything, just ...
WILLIAM FAULKNER
When, some months later, Zoltan emailed me about his decision to run for president, I immediately ca...
MARK O'CONNELL
Daniel, he said. I would have you follow me.

Master!....I will fight for you to the end!....
ELIZABETH GEORGE SPEARE
What the hell," I said, pushing off the wall, ready to take off the head of whatever stupid salesper...
SARAH DESSEN
She's going to do nothing but try to trick information out of me that I shouldn't be giving her, Mac...
JIM BUTCHER
I love swimming"
"I know," I said.
"I love swimming," he said again. He was quiet for a li...
BENJAMIN ALIRE SáENZ
Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit's clever."
"And he h...
A.A. MILNE
You bit de Quincey," he said. "You fool. He's a vampire. You know what it means to bite a vampire." ...
CASSANDRA CLARE
No milk," I said.

"No milk," said my sister.

I watched my dad think about this...
NEIL GAIMAN
I blame everything on LIFE!
I was happy being dead until I had a new LIFE!
I was alone, bu...
ANTHONY T.HINCKS
Plastic ware," he said slowly, "like knives and forks and spoons?"
I brushed a bit of dirt off ...
SARAH DESSEN
[Ranger] "How's your mental health?" he asked. "I heard about Soder."
[Stephanie] "I'm rattled....
JANET EVANOVICH
What is it, Angel?" she said, starting up. "Have they come for me?"

"Yes, dearest," he sa...
THOMAS HARDY
I should go," I said thickly. "Let me know when you want to start practice again. And thanks for...t...
RICHELLE MEAD
He pointed the gun at me. Then he looked up at my hand & tilted his head slightly.
- Journe...
STEVE TOLTZ
Do you remember me telling you we are practicing non-verbal spells, Potter?"
"Yes," said Harry ...
J.K. ROWLING
Eros mumbled something.
"I'm sorry?" said Aphrodite.
"Whatwouldjesusdo."
"What would ...
MARIE PHILLIPS
The shaman helps you figure it out. I already know what I'm going to be."

I prodded him i...
ROSE CHRISTO
I dialed the number slowly, wanting to get it right. Two rings, and he picked up.
"Yes," I sai...
SARAH DESSEN
Saiman reached into the trunk and pulled out a pink tulle tutu.
“No.”
“Yes.” ILONA ANDREWS
So look," he began, leaning over the desk, "I was—"
"Excuse me?" Bethany said. Her voice was ...
SARAH DESSEN
What did she say to you?"
"Nothing."
"Oh, great. I have to try to get you out of this mess...
MELINA MARCHETTA
Mom." I couldn't believe she was doing this again. She was taking this moment, this time when I was ...
SARAH DESSEN
You are real," she said to herself.

"Aye." His voice was deep and resonant, a caress in h...
J.R. WARD
After a while Mary said, “Zsadist?”

“Yeah?”

“What are those markings...
J.R. WARD
I made up my mind I was going to find someone who would love me unconditionally three hundred and si...
HARUKI MURAKAMI
O Deep Thought computer," he said, "the task we have designed you to perform is this. We want you to...
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Thought you were--'
'--Raphael said--'
'I said, no way in hell--'
'Damn straight--' NALINI SINGH
You've known him how long?" Malcolm asked.
"Since he was a small boy. I firs noticed him when ...
JOHN FLANAGAN
People are not an interruption of our business. People are our business.
A man's worst difficulties begin when he is able to do as he likes.
It is hard to look up to a leader who keeps his ear to the ground.
The most wasted day of all is that in which we have not laughed.
The more intelligent a man is, the more originality he discovers in men. Ordinary people see no diff...
The intelligence is proved not by ease of learning, but by understanding what we learn.
Communication is something so simple and difficult that we can never put it in simple words.
Like threads of silver seen through crystal beads
Let love through good deeds show.
How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.
In everyone's heart stirs a great homesickness.
That is the supreme value of history. The study of it is the best guarantee against repeating it.
Our wisdom comes usually from our experience, and our experience comes largely from our experience.
One thing about the school of experience is that it will repeat the lesson if you flunk the first ti...
To reprove small faults within due vehemence, is as absurd as if a man should take a great hammer to...
Faith is like electricity. You can't see it, but you can see the light.
Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it by the handle of anxiety, or by the handle of...
Some families can trace their ancestors back three hundred years, but can't tell you where their chi...
A recent survey was said to prove that the people we Americans most admire are our politicians and d...
If a man defrauds you one time, he is a rascal; if he does it twice, you are a fool.
Flattery looks like friendship, just like a wolf looks like a dog.
Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.
Courage is always greatest when blended with meekness; intellectual ability is most admired when it ...
Freedom also includes the right to mismanage your own affairs.
Let your friends be the friends of your deliberate choice.
The man who has strong opinions and always says what he thinks is courageous - and friendless.
Friendship is love with understanding.
So few people think. When we find one who really does, we call him a genius
Your life can't go according to plan if you have no plan.
Practicing the Golden Rule is not a sacrifice; it is an investment.
Conversation is an exercise of the mind; gossip is merely an exercise of the tongue.
An expert gossiper knows how much to leave out of a conversation
To live so that you would not be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip, is to have li...
Gossip is sometimes referred to as halitosis of the mind
If you would attain greatness, think no little thoughts.
We are born brave, trusting and greedy, and most of us remain greedy.
People are changed, not by coercion or intimidation, but by example.
Children are natural mimics; they act like their parents in spite of every effort to teach them good...
The guilty catch themselves.
Good habits are formed; bad habits we fall into.
If happiness could be brought, few of us could pay the price.
Happiness will never come to those who fail to appreciate what they already have.
Happiness is in the heart, not in the circumstances.
It's never too late to have a happy childhood.
Hatred is a boomerang which is sure to hit you harder than the one at whom you throw it.
Hate pollutes the mind.
If we miraculously became the people we hate, how lovable we would find ourselves.
To feel "fit as a fiddle" you must tone down your middle.
Our health always seems much more valuable after we lose it.
A patient going to a doctor for his first visit was asked, "And whom did you consult before coming t...
"Oh," replied his patient, with no malice aforethought, "he told me to come and see you."
It is impossible to make wisdom hereditary.
Honesty is a question of right or wrong, not a matter of policy.
It is a pleasure to give advice, humiliating to need it, normal to ignore it.
It is almost impossible to smile on the outside without feeling better on the inside.
Too many people confine their exercise to jumping to conclusions, running up bills, stretching the t...
Imagination was given man to compensate for what he is not, and a sense of humor to console him for ...
Humor - the perfect relationship of the parts to the whole.
Our five senses are incomplete without the sixth - a sense of humor.
"What made the deepest impression upon you?" inquired a friend one day of Lincoln, "when you stood i...
It isn't easy for an idea to squeeze itself into a head filled with prejudice.
Too many people run out of ideas long before they run out of words.
Imagination is the pontoon bridge making way for the timid feet of reason.
Practical observation commonly consists of collecting a few facts and loading them with guesses.
Friendship is a living thing that lasts only as long as it is nourished with kindness, empathy and u...
Having supplied them with names, omnipotence, justice, knowledge, Providence, - what are they?
A good laugh is sunshine in a house.
When you laugh, be sure to laugh at what people do and not at what people are.

More Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

The Fourteenth Book is entitled, "What can a Thoughtful Man Hope for Mankind on Earth, Given the Exp...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
No matter how corrupt, greedy, and heartless our government, our corporations, our media, and our re...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintena...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The last thing I ever wanted was to be alive when the three most powerful people on the whole planet...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
And on the subject of burning books: I want to congratulate librarians, not famous for their physica...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
People took such awful chances with chemicals and their bodies because they wanted the quality of th...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The darkest secret of this country, I am afraid, is that too many of its citizens imagine that they ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
You know — we've had to imagine the war here, and we have imagined that it was being fought by agi...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than bef...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
To pay homage to beauty is to admire Nature; to admire Nature is to worship God
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Those who believe in telekinetics, raise my hand.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
God damn it, you've got to be kind.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes (Matthew 5). But, o...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
If you want to really hurt you parents, and you don't have the nerve to be gay, the least you can do...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. There is no why.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Her pleasure went on and on, and so did Ben's. Ben could almost smell the gardenia, could almost see...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled "science fiction" ... and I would like ou...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I say in speeches that a plausible mission of artists is to make people appreciate being alive at le...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
He tried. That's the big thing. He tried to do the best he could with what God gave him. He should g...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Nothing ever really ends. That’s the horrible part of being in the short-story business—you have...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I thought scientists were going to find out exactly how everything worked, and then make it work bet...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The universe is a big place, perhaps the biggest.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Love is where you find it. I think it is foolish to go around looking for it, and I think it can be ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thin...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
People don't come to church for preachments, of course, but to daydream about God.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter can be said to remed...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
If you're never scared or embarrassed or hurt, it means you never take any chances
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
We could have saved the Earth but we were too damned cheap.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
We are healthy only to the extent that our ideas are humane.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Thus did a handful of rapacious citizens come to control all that was worth controlling in America. ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter can be said to reme...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR
I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
I had made her so unhappy that she had developed a sense of humor. [-Rabo Karabekian]
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I still believe that peace and plenty and happiness can be worked out some way. I am a fool.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I am committing suicide by cigarette,” I replied. She thought that was reasonably funny. I didn’...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
If there really had been a Mercutio, and if there really were a Paradise, Mercutio might be hanging ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Anyone unable to understand how useful religion can be founded on lies will not understand this book...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Don’t give up on books. They feel so good—their friendly heft. The sweet reluctance of their pag...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I found the words to kill the love, didn't I -" she said, "the love that couldn't be killed?
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
His mother understood my illness immediately, that it was my world rather than myself that was disea...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I froze. It was not guilt that froze me. I had taught myself never to feel guilt. It was not a ghast...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
So I am about to be a free man again, to wander where I please.
I find the prospect nauseating....
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
What can any one person do?' he said.
'Each person does a little something,' I said, 'and there...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Most things in this world don´t work, aspirin do.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Let there be nothing harmonious about our children's playthings, lest they grow up expecting peace a...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I had hoped, as a broadcaster, to be merely ludicrous, but this is a hard world to be ludicrous in, ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
No young person on earth is so excellent in all respects as to need no uncritical love.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
People should be changed by world wars," I said, "else what are world wars for?
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Since there is no one else to praise me, I will praise myself -- will say that I have never tampered...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I saw a huge steam roller,
It blotted out the sun.
The people all lay down, lay down; KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I have never seen a more sublime demonstration of the totalitarian mind, a mind which might be linke...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Society is more concerned with material possessions than it is with the true love and compassion of ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The New York Daily News suggested that my biggest war crime was not killing myself like a gentleman....
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Oh, God — the lives people try to lead.
Oh, God — what a world they try to lead them in.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There are plenty of good reasons for fighting, I said, but no good reason ever to hate without reser...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There are plenty of good reasons for fighting,' I said, 'but no good reason ever to hate without res...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I love you, because the love you gave me was the only love I've ever had, the only love I ever will ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There is nothing left of him but curiosity and a pair of eyes.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
...this is a hard world to be ludicrous in, with so many human beings so reluctant to laugh, so inca...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
You hate America, don't you?'

That would be as silly as loving it,' I said. 'It's impossi...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
All people are insane. They will do anything at any time, and God help anybody who looks for reasons...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There are plenty of good reasons for fighting...but no good reason to ever hate without reservation,...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
We'd been apart so long--I'd been dead so long," she said in English. "I thought surely you'd built ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
And yet another moral occurs to me now: Make love when you can. It's good for you.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Say what you will about the sweet miracle of unquestioning faith, I consider a capacity for it terri...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I felt after I finished Slaughterhouse-Five that I didn’t have to write at all anymore if I didn�...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I am a humanist, which means, in part, that I have tried to behave decently without expectations of ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Being a Humanist means trying to behave decently without expectation of rewards or punishment after ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Most writers are not quick-witted when they talk. Novelists, in particular, drag themselves around ...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Of all the words of mice and men, the saddest are, "It might have been.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
America is the wealthiest nation on Earth, but its people are mainly poor, and poor Americans are ur...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There is love enough in this world for everybody, if people will just look.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I think that novels that leave out technology misrepresent life as badly as Victorians misrepresente...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thin...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Plato says that the unexamined life is not worth living. But what if the examined life turns out to ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
In the beginning, God created the earth, and he looked upon it in His cosmic loneliness.

...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I thought Beatrice Keedsler had joined hands with other old-fashioned storytellers to make people be...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Artists use frauds to make human beings seem more wonderful than they really are. Dancers show us hu...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
You know what truth is? [...] It's some crazy thing my neighbor believes. If I want to make friends ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
.The insane, on occasion, are not without their charms
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion . . . . I myself prefer to lau...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion . . . . I myself prefer to laugh...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
.The insane, on occasion, are not without their charms
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
A walk?" said Catharine.
"One foot in front of the other," said Newt, "through leaves, over bri...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
What is my definition of jazz? 'Safe sex of the highest order.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I have this disease late at night sometimes, involving alcohol and the telephone.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The only difference between KURT VONNEGUT JR. We are impossibly conceited animals, and actually dumb as heck. Ask any teacher. You don't even have...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
There's only one me, and I'm stuck with him.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
We are healthy only to the extent that our ideas are humane.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintena...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
If somebody says, ''I love you,'' to me, I feel as though I had a pistol pointed at my head. What ca...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
How nice -- to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Just because some of us can read and write and do a little math, that doesn't mean we deserve to con...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
We are what we imagine ourselves to be.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Be careful what you pretend to be because you are what you pretend to be.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all the ki...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I was a victim of a series of accidents, as are we all.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
So it goes.
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
We are all what we pretend to be, but, we had better be very careful what we pretend.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
About astrology and palmistry: they are good because they make people vivid and full of possibilitie...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I am of course a skeptic about the divinity of Christ and a scorner of the notion that there is a Go...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
You cannot be a good writer of serious fiction if you are not depressed
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Suicide is the punctuation mark at the end of many artistic careers
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
A Lovers a liar, to himself he lies. The truthful are loveless, like oysters their eyes
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Men are jerks. Women are psychotic.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Just because some of us can read and write and do a little math, that doesn't mean we deserve to con...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Unexpected travel suggestions are dancing lessons from God
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter can be said to remed...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
So it goes.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Make love when you can. It's good for you.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion . . . . I myself prefer to laugh...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Artists use frauds to make human beings seem more wonderful than they really are. Dancers show us hu...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Being American is to eat a lot of beef steak, and boy, we've got a lot more beef steak than any othe...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Well, to admire the hell out of Jesus Christ or of everyone who speaks well. And, well my grandfathe...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
We would have said the Nazis were evil in any event, since we had decided to fight them. This has al...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
It posed the question posed by all such stone piles: how had puny men moved stones so big? And, like...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Almost every war ends, properly, with its veterans feeling deceived and pointless and gullible, with...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
It goes against the American storytelling grain to have someone in a situation he can't get out of, ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
We would be a lot safer if the Government would take its money out of science and put it into astrol...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The feeling about a soldier is, when all is said and done, he wasn't really going to do very much wi...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I was taught that the human brain was the crowning glory of evolution so far, but I think it's a ver...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There's only one me, and I'm stuck with him.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The two real political parties in America are the Winners and the Losers. The people don't acknowled...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I was a victim of a series of accidents, as are we all...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I'm wild again, beguiled again, a wimpering, simpering child I am.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
History is merely a list of surprises. It can only prepare us to be surprised yet again.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Most writers are not quick-witted when they talk. Novelists, in particular, drag themselves around i...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Find a subject you care about and which you feel others should care about. It is this genuine caring...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
I'd rather have written 'Cheers' than anything I've written.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Life happens too fast for you ever to think about it. If you could just persuade people of this, but...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
There is no way a beautiful woman can live up to what she looks like for an appreciable length of ti...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Thinking doesn't seem to help very much. The human brain is too high-powered to have many practical ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
We are what we imagine ourselves to be.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
If somebody says, ''I love you,'' to me, I feel as though I had a pistol pointed at my head. What ca...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
High School is closer to the core of the American experience than anything else I can think of.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
How nice -- to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
The feeling about a soldier is, when all is said and done, he wasn't really going to do very much wi...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
As Bokonon says: 'peculiar travel suggestions are dancing lessons from god.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Christ, back in Chicago, we don’t make bicycles any more. It’s all
human relations now. The...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Of course it is exhausting, having to reason all the time in a universe which wasn't meant to be rea...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Being American is to eat a lot of beef steak, and boy, we've got a lot more beef steak than any othe...
KURT VONNEGUT, JR.
Everything about life is a joke. Don't you know that?
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Popular as he was as a graduation speaker, Vonnegut never graduated from college.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
Men want a lot of pals—and they don’t want people to get mad at them.
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
One sort of optional thing you might do is to realize there are six seasons instead of four. The poe...
KURT VONNEGUT JR.
My cash cows, the slick magazines, were put out of business by TV.
KURT VONNEGUT
I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all the ki...
KURT VONNEGUT
Oh, sure, we have another world war coming, and another great depression, but where are the leaders ...
KURT VONNEGUT
Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been...
KURT VONNEGUT
If you are an American, you must allow all ideas to circulate freely in your community, not merely y...
KURT VONNEGUT
There is love enough in this world for everybody, if people will just look.
KURT VONNEGUT
I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.
KURT VONNEGUT
I let the dog out, or I let him in, and we talk some. I let him know I like him, and he lets me know...
KURT VONNEGUT
If you can do a half-assed job of anything, you're a one-eyed man in a kingdom of the blind.
KURT VONNEGUT
I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different.
KURT VONNEGUT
Human beings will be happier - not when they cure cancer or get to Mars or eliminate racial prejudic...
KURT VONNEGUT
What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thin...
KURT VONNEGUT
Everyone now knows how to find the meaning of life within himself. But mankind wasn't always so ...
KURT VONNEGUT
People have to talk about something just to keep their voice boxes in working order so they'll h...
KURT VONNEGUT
If somebody says, I love you, to me, I feel as though I had a pistol pointed at my head. What can an...
KURT VONNEGUT
I get up at 7:30 and work four hours a day. Nine to twelve in the morning, five to six in the evenin...
KURT VONNEGUT
Thinking doesn't seem to help very much. The human brain is too high-powered to have many practical ...
KURT VONNEGUT
What war has always been is a puberty ceremony. It's a very rough one, but you went away a boy and c...
KURT VONNEGUT
The two real political parties in America are the Winners and the Losers. The people don't acknowled...
KURT VONNEGUT
Being American is to eat a lot of beef steak, and boy, we've got a lot more beef steak than any othe...
KURT VONNEGUT
... this is a hard world to be ludicrous in, with so many human beings so reluctant to laugh, so inc...
KURT VONNEGUT
The feeling about a soldier is, when all is said and done, he wasn't really going to do very much wi...
KURT VONNEGUT
We are all what we pretend to be, but, we had better be very careful what we pretend.
KURT VONNEGUT
I was taught that the human brain was the crowning glory of evolution so far, but I think it's a ver...
KURT VONNEGUT
I want to stay as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all kinds o...
KURT VONNEGUT
We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.
KURT VONNEGUT
Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than befo...
KURT VONNEGUT
People have to talk about something just to keep their voice boxes in working order, so they'll have...
KURT VONNEGUT
There is no order in the world around us, we must adapt ourselves to the requirements of chaos inste...
KURT VONNEGUT
There's only one me, and I'm stuck with him.
KURT VONNEGUT
I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled Science Fiction and I would like out, par...
KURT VONNEGUT
Be careful what you pretend to be because you are what you pretend to be.
KURT VONNEGUT
Artists use frauds to make human beings seem more wonderful than they really are. Dancers show us hu...
KURT VONNEGUT
There are plenty of good reasons for fighting, I said, but no good reason ever to have without reser...
KURT VONNEGUT
Life happens too fast for you ever to think about it. If you could just persuade people of this, but...
KURT VONNEGUT
It was a thunderingly beautiful experience -- voluptuous, sexual, dangerous, and expensive as hell.
KURT VONNEGUT
We would be a lot safer if the Government would take its money out of science and put it into astrol...
KURT VONNEGUT
Here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. There is no why.
KURT VONNEGUT
Still and all, why bother? Here's my answer. Many people need desperately to receive this messag...
KURT VONNEGUT
Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter could be said to rem...
KURT VONNEGUT
I have no degree in biochemistry, neither do I have one in mechanical engineering, as the Army saw f...
KURT VONNEGUT
True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the countr...
KURT VONNEGUT
What troubles me most about my lovely country is that its children are seldom taught that American f...
KURT VONNEGUT
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since...
KURT VONNEGUT