- I always had trouble ending short stories in ways that would satisfy a general public. In real life, as during a rerun following a timequake, people don’t change, don’t learn anything from their mistakes, and don’t apologize. In a short story they have to do at least two out of three of those things, or you might as well throw it away in the lidless wire trash receptacle chained and padlocked to the fire hydrant in front of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. - View Quote Details on I always had trouble ending short stories in ways that…
- I like to sleep. I published a new requiem for old music in another book, in which I said it was no bad thing to want sleep for everyone as an afterlife. - View Quote Details on I like to sleep. I published a new requiem for…
- If you really want to hurt your parents, and you don’t have nerve enough to be a homosexual, the least you can do is go into the arts. - View Quote Details on If you really want to hurt your parents, and you…
- I am eternally grateful.. for my knack of finding in great books, some of them very funny books, reason enough to feel honored to be alive, no matter what else might be going on. - View Quote Details on I am eternally grateful.. for my knack of finding in…
- Xanthippe thought her husband, Socrates, was a fool. Aunt Raye thought Uncle Alex was a fool. Mother thought Father was a fool. My wife thinks I am a fool. Wild again, beguiled again, a whimpering, simpering child again. Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered am I. - View Quote Details on Xanthippe thought her husband, Socrates, was a fool. Aunt Raye…
- You were sick, but now you’re well again, and there’s work to do. (Kilgore’s Creed) - View Quote Details on You were sick, but now you’re well again, and there’s…
- She was a widow, and he stripped himself naked while she went to fetch some of her husband’s clothes. But before he could put them on, the police were hammering on the front door with their billy clubs. So the fugitive hid on top of a rafter. When the woman let in the police, though, his oversize testicles hung down in full view.”
Trout paused again.
“The police asked the woman where the guy was. The woman said she didn’t know what guy they were talking about,” said Trout. “One of the cops saw the testicles hanging down from a rafter and asked what they were. She said they were Chinese temple bells. He believed her. He said he ‘d always wanted to hear Chinese temple bells. “He gave them a whack with his billy club, but there was no sound. So he hit them again, a lot harder, a whole lot harder. Do you know what the guy on the rafter shrieked?” Trout asked me. I said I didn’t. “He shrieked, ‘TING-A-LING, YOU SON OF A BITCH!’ - View Quote Details on She was a widow, and he stripped himself naked while…
- If there is a god, he sure hates people. That’s all I can say. - View Quote Details on If there is a god, he sure hates people. That’s…
- I will say too, that lovemaking, if sincere, is one of the best ideas Satan put in the apple she gave to the serpent to give to Eve. - View Quote Details on I will say too, that lovemaking, if sincere, is one…
- You want to know why I don’t have AIDS, why I’m not HIV-positive like so many other people? I don’t fuck around. It’s as simple as that. - View Quote Details on You want to know why I don’t have AIDS, why…
- There is no way a beautiful woman can live up to what she looks like for any appreciable length of time. - View Quote Details on There is no way a beautiful woman can live up…
- We are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is.” - View Quote Details on We are here to help each other get through this…
- Literature is all those la-di- da monkeys next door care about. “Those artsy fartsy twerps next door create living, breathing, three-dimensional characters with ink on paper”. - View Quote Details on Literature is all those la-di- da monkeys next door care…
- Many people need desperately to receive this message: “I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people don’t care about them. You are not alone.” - View Quote Details on Many people need desperately to receive this message: “I feel…
- I thank [Kilgore] Trout for the concept of the man-woman hour as a unit of measurement of marital intimacy. This is an hour during which a husband and wife are close enough to be aware of each other, and for one to say something to the other without yelling, if he or she feels like it. Trout says in his story “Golden Wedding” that they needn’t feel like saying anything in order to credit themselves with a man-woman hour. [...][A character in Trout's story] calculates that an average couple with separate places of work logs four man-woman hours each weekday, and sixteen of them on the weekends. Being asleep with each other doesn’t count. This gives him a standard man-woman week of thirty-six man-woman hours.He multiplies that by fifty-two. This gives him, when rounded off, a standard man-woman year of eighteen hundred man-woman hours. He advertises that any couple that has accumulated this many man-woman hours is entitled to celebrate an anniversary… - View Quote Details on I thank [Kilgore] Trout for the concept of the man-woman…
- If your brains were dynamite, there wouldn’t be enough to blow your hat off. - View Quote Details on If your brains were dynamite, there wouldn’t be enough to…
- I am too lazy to chase down the exact quotation but the British astronomer Fred Hoyle said something to this effect: The believing in Darwin’s theoretical mechanisms of evolution was like believing that a hurricane could blow through a junkyard and build a Boeing 747. No matter what is doing the creating. I have to say that the giraffe and the rhinoceros are ridiculous. And so is the human brain, capable, in cahoots with the more sensitive parts of the body, such as the ding dong, of hating life while pretending to love it, and behaving accordingly: Somebody shoot me while I’m happy! - View Quote Details on I am too lazy to chase down the exact quotation…
- Let me note that Kilgore Trout and I have never used semicolons. They don’t do anything, don’t suggest anything. They are transvestite hermaphrodites. - View Quote Details on Let me note that Kilgore Trout and I have never…
- Science never cheered up anyone. The truth about the human situation is just too awful. - View Quote Details on Science never cheered up anyone. The truth about the human…
- There is a planet in the solar system, where the people are so stupid, they didn’t catch on for a million years that there was another halve to their planet. They didn’t figure that out until 500 years ago. - View Quote Details on There is a planet in the solar system, where the…
- I say that anybody whose life keeps tangling up with yours for no logical reason is likely a member of your karass, a team God has formed to get something done for him. - View Quote Details on I say that anybody whose life keeps tangling up with…
- At Xanadu in 2001, I asked Kilgore Trout for his ballpark opinion of John Wilkes Booth. He said Booth’s performance in Ford’s Theater in Washington, D.C., on the night of Good Friday, April 14th, 1865, when he shot Lincoln and then jumped from a theater box to the stage, breaking his leg, was ‘the sort of thing which is bound to happen when ever an actor creates his own material’ - View Quote Details on At Xanadu in 2001, I asked Kilgore Trout for his…
- As though the planet weren’t already dying because it has three billion too many living, breathing, three-dimensional characters. - View Quote Details on As though the planet weren’t already dying because it has…
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