Joseph Heller quotes - page 2

If character is destiny, the good are damned. (Joseph Heller)
If God was dead, how could I feel this bad? View quote
Joseph Heller
The years are too short, the days are too long. View quote
Joseph Heller
From now on I'm thinking only of me.” Major Danby replied indulgently with a superior smile: "But, Yossarian, suppose everyone felt that way?” "Then,” said Yossarian, "I'd certainly be a damned fool to feel any other way, wouldn't I? View quote
Joseph Heller
Man was matter, that was Snowden's secret. Drop him out a window, and he'll fall. Set fire to him and he'll burn. Bury him and he'll rot, like other kinds of garbage. The spirit gone, man is garbage. That was Snowden's secret. Ripeness was all. View quote
Joseph Heller
There is no disappointment so numbing...as someone no better than you achieving more. View quote
Joseph Heller
Well, he died. You don't get any older than that. View quote
Joseph Heller
Morale was deteriorating and it was all Yossarian's fault. The country was in peril; he was jeopardizing his traditional rights of freedom and independence by daring to exercise them. View quote
Joseph Heller
Let's take a drive into the middle of nowhere with a packet of Marlboro lights and talk about our lives. View quote
Joseph Heller
Is he in heaven? Is he in hell?" "There is no heaven. There is no hell." "There is no heaven? There is no hell?" "That's all in your mind. View quote
Joseph Heller
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you. (Joseph Heller)
Men," he began his address to the officers, measuring his pauses carefully. "You're American officers. The officers of no other army in the world can make that statement. Think about it. View quote
Joseph Heller
I wouldn't want to live without strong misgivings. View quote
Joseph Heller
Hasn't it ever occurred to you that in your promiscuous pursuit of women you are merely trying to assuage your subconscious fears of sexual impotence?" "Yes, sir, it has." "Then why do you do it?" "To assuage my fears of sexual impotence. View quote
Joseph Heller
Yossarian decided to change the subject. "Now you're changing the subject." he pointed out diplomatically. "I'll bet I can name two things to be miserable about for every one you can name to be thankful for. View quote
Joseph Heller
I do know that girls in their early twenties are easy and sweet. (Girls in their late twenties are easier but sad, and that isn't so sweet.) They are easy, I think, because they are sweet, and they are sweet, I think, because they are dumb. View quote
Joseph Heller
I'm not even sure we really had that much need for God as much as we did seem to have a need to believe in Him. View quote
Joseph Heller
The truth is whatever people will believe is the truth. Don't you know history? View quote
Joseph Heller
If the chance ever comes to you to fall in love, grab it, every time. You might always live to regret it, but you won't find anything to beat it, and you won't know if it will come to you once more. View quote
Joseph Heller
Women don't suffer from penis envy. Men do. View quote
Joseph Heller
But I make a profit of three and a quarter cents an egg by selling them for four and a quarter cents an egg to the people in Malta I buy them from for seven cents an egg. Of course, I don't make the profit. The syndicate makes the profit. And everybody has a share. (Joseph Heller)
God is a murderer, imagine that. I told you I had the best story in the Bible, didn't I? I have always known that He was. Sooner or later He murders us all, doesn't He, and we go back to the dust from which we came. So I'm no longer scared to defy him. All He can do is kill me. View quote
Joseph Heller
God does have this self-serving habit of putting all blame for His own mistakes on other people, doesn't He? He picks someone arbitrarily, unbidden, right out of the blue so to speak, and levies upon them tasks of monumental difficulty for which we don't always measure up in every particular, then charges US for HIS error in selecting imperfectly. He tends to forget that we are no more infallible than He is. View quote
Joseph Heller
Let someone else get killed!" "Suppose everyone on our side felt that way?" "Well then I'd certainly be a damned fool to feel any other way, wouldn't I? View quote
Joseph Heller
Peace on earth would mean the end of civilization as we know it. View quote
Joseph Heller