Quotes from JR

William Gaddis ·  752 pages

Rating: (2.3K votes)


“If you want to make a million you don't have to understand money, what you have to understand is people's fears about money”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“-Put on the lights there, now. Before we go any further here, has it ever occurred to any of you that all this is simply one grand misunderstanding? Since you're not here to learn anything, but to be taught so you can pass these tests, knowledge has to be organized so it can be taught, and it has to be reduced to information so it can be organized do you follow that? In other words this leads you to assume that organization is an inherent property of knowledge itself, and that disorder and chaos are simply irrelevant forces that threaten it from outside. In fact it's exactly the opposite. Order is simply a thin, perilous condition we try to impose on the basic reality of chaos...”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“I mean why should somebody go steal and break the law to get all they can when there's always some law where you can be legal and get it all anyway!”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“Has it ever occurred to any of you that all this is simply one grand misunderstanding? Since you're not here to learn anything, but to be taught so you can pass these tests, knowledge has to be organized so it can be taught, and it has to be reduced to information so it can be organized do you follow that? In other words this leads you to assume that organization is an inherent property of the knowledge itself, and that disorder and chaos are simply irrelevant forces that threaten it from the outside. In fact it's exactly the opposite. Order is simply a thin, perilous condition we try to impose on the basic reality of chaos...”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“—Problem what happened he always woke up the same person went to bed the night before only way he knew it these God damned words going through his head, go to bed knew he’d wake up the same God damned person finally couldn’t take it anymore, same God damned words waiting for him only thing to do get rid of the God damned container for the thing contained, God damned words come around next morning God damned container smashed on the sidewalk no place for them to . . .”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR



“Get a black suit and just freeload, problem it's too God damned late now even to be any of the things I never wanted to be.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“-And there's this twelve thousand dollars item for books.
-That supposed to be twelve hundred, the twelve thousand is for paper.
towels. Besides there is already that bequest for the library.
-Did it say books in so many words? No. It's just a bequest for the library.
-Use it for pegboard. You need pegboard in a library. Books you don't know what you're getting into.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“The function of this school is custodial. It’s here to keep these kids off the streets until the girls are big enough to get pregnant and the boys are old enough to go out and hold up a gas station.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“... and she turned for the stairs as the sound of rain came, finally, scattered across the roof, a fall that now gave substance to the stilled beams of headlamps in the drive where those of flashlights rose and fell to the cadenced steps come back and round the range of yew and up the terrace and through the door to fall on broken glass and flee across the inkstained carpet, darting, climbing, caught fixed in niches, they scaled the walls and leaped the beams to skirt the hayloft.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“-Money? in a voice that rustled.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR



“You see I still have confidence in you sir, or should I say the artist who dwells within you, the artist who disdains such mundane details as selecting a fresh shirt in the morning, who steps forth into the workday world the rest of us inhabit indifferent to the glances he draws because his shoes fail to match, why? Because his mind has been elsewhere, his inner ear tuned to the sonorous tones of horn and kettledrum, tones it is his sacred duty to let us hear with him.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“has it ever occurred to any of you that all this is simply one grand misunderstanding? Since you’re not here to learn anything, but to be taught so you can pass these tests, knowledge has to be organized so it can be taught, and it has to be reduced to information so it can be organized do you follow that? In other words this leads you to assume that organization is an inherent property of the knowledge itself, and that disorder and chaos are simply irrelevant forces that threaten it from outside. In fact it’s exactly the opposite. Order is simply a thin, perilous condition we try to impose on the basic reality of chaos . . ”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“In simple straightforward terms Dan, you might say that he structured the material in terms of the ongoing situation to tangibilitate the utilization potential of this one to one instructional medium in such a meaningful learning experience that these
kids won’t forget it for a hell of a long time, how's that Whiteback.”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


“success and like free enterprise and all”
― William Gaddis, quote from JR


About the author

William Gaddis
Born place: in New York, New York, The United States
Born date December 29, 1922
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Joley likes to be scared, and she can't watch them alone."
"I don't know how you can make that sound perfectly logical.”
― Christine Feehan, quote from Safe Harbor


“Ésa es la razón de que, cuando di el primer paso para cambiar mi vida, estudiara con detenimiento en qué estaba gastando mi energía mental. Tuve que examinar los resultados de la energía que invertía en mis pensamientos con tanta atención como lo hacía con la que consumía para fortalecer mi cuerpo físico.”
― Bruce H. Lipton, quote from The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter and Miracles


“And when someone accuses you of being selfish, just remember that he’s upset only because you aren’t doing what he selfishly wants you to do.”
― quote from How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World: A Handbook for Personal Liberty


“It was the equivalent of asking a little girl not to scream the first time she was personally introduced to
Hannah Montana.”
― J.A. Saare, quote from Dead, Undead, or Somewhere in Between


“Running doesn't just make me happy. Running keeps me alive. When I'm running-the blood pumping through my veins, the tunes playing in my ears, the muscles tightening on the inclines- the problems of the world disappear. It's just me, the sidewalk, and God.”
― Lisa Schroeder, quote from Chasing Brooklyn


Interesting books

Night of the Soul Stealer
(22.9K)
Night of the Soul St...
by Joseph Delaney
In His Steps
(20.7K)
In His Steps
by Charles M. Sheldon
Timeless
(9.7K)
Timeless
by Alexandra Monir
One for the Murphys
(19.5K)
One for the Murphys
by Lynda Mullaly Hunt
Prokleta avlija
(5.7K)
Prokleta avlija
by Ivo Andrić
Tall, Tatted and Tempting
(25.8K)

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.