Kurt Vonnegut · 331 pages
Rating: (45.4K votes)
“A sane person to an insane society must appear insane.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I wish you'd help me look into a more interesting problem - namely, my sanity.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“The public health authorities never mention the main reason many Americans have for smoking heavily, which is that smoking is a fairly sure, fairly honorable form of suicide.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I'm odd, I know,' he said. 'It's fear of myself that's made me odd.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I have been a writer since 1949. I am self-taught. I have no theories about writing that might help others. When I write, I simply become what I seemingly must become. I am six feet two and weigh nearly two hundred pounds and am badly coordinated, except when I swim. All that borrowed meat does the writing.
In the water I am beautiful. ”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“What in hell is a girl with hips like yours doing selling death?”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“And I realize now that the two main themes of my novels were stated by my siblings: 'Here I am, cleaning shit off of practically everything' and 'No pain.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Our aim is to make the world more beautiful than it was when we came into it. It can be done. You can do it--love yourself”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“He had the air of a spy in a melodrama, missing nothing, liking nothing, looking forward to the great day when everything would be turned upside down.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Or they'll talk about fear, which we used to call politics- job politics, social politics, government politics”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I don't want to be a machine, and I don't want to think about war," EPICAC had written after Pat's and my
lighthearted departure. "I want to be made out of protoplasm and last forever so Pat will love me. But fate
has made me a machine. That is the only problem I cannot solve. That is the only problem I want to solve. I
can't go on this way." I swallowed hard. "Good luck, my friend. Treat our Pat well. I am going to shortcircuit myself out of your lives forever. You will find on the remainder of this tape a modest wedding
present from your friend, EPICAC.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I think that scientific persons of the future will scoff at scientific persons of the present. They will scoff because scientific persons of the present thought so many important things were superstitious.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Nobody ever went broke overestimating the vulgarity of the American people,”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“There are too many of us, and we are all too far apart,”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“John,” I said, “when you get older, you’re going to understand a lot of things you don’t understand now.” “You must mean nuclear physics,” he said. “I can hardly wait.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“When machines start delivering themselves,” I said, “I guess that’s when the people better start really worrying.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I am committing suicide by cigarette,” I replied. She thought that was reasonably funny. I didn’t. I thought it was hideous that I should scorn life that much, sucking away on cancer sticks. My brand is Pall Mall. The authentic suicides ask for Pall Malls. The dilettantes ask for Pell Mells.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“A woman's not a woman till the pills wear off.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I may not know what love is,” he said, “but, by God, at least I’ve never gotten drunk by myself.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“nervously. “I have never dared to concentrate as hard as I can for fear of the damage I might do. I’m to the point where a mere whim is a blockbuster.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Fred Bockman is thirty and looks eighteen. Life has left no marks on him, because he hasn’t paid much attention to it.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I am committing suicide by cigarette,” I replied. She thought that was reasonably funny. I didn’t. I thought it was hideous that I should scorn life that much, sucking away on cancer sticks.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“think that scientific persons of the future will scoff at scientific persons of the present. They will scoff because scientific persons of the present thought so many important things were superstitions.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“That's a mistake,' he said. 'You miss an awful lot of life that way. That's why you Yankees are so cold,' he said. 'You think too much. That's why you marry so seldom.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I have never dared to concentrate as hard as I can for fear of the damage I might do. I’m to the point where a mere whim is a blockbuster.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes.” —Thoreau”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“I never knew a writer’s wife who wasn’t beautiful.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Don't forget to wind the restricted clock and put the confidential cat out.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
“Doris said the only thing anybody can say in an amateur theatrical society when somebody cries. She said, “Why, no dear—you were marvelous.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Welcome to the Monkey House
Kurt Vonnegut
Born place: in Indianapolis, Indiana, The United States
Born date November 11, 1922
See more on GoodReads
“... Once I start a book I finish it. That was the way one was brought up. Books, bread and butter, mashed potato - one finishes what's on one's plate. That's always been my philosophy.”
― Alan Bennett, quote from The Uncommon Reader
“I certainly didn’t feel like writing anymore. I couldn’t explain why, but the only emotion that I could arouse were feelings of anger and after staying mad all day and half the night, I was just plain tired. Mad at what? Just about everything, for just about everything was done wrong or it wasn’t done perfectly. Since nothing but perfection was acceptable, I stayed mad.”
― Dick Winters, quote from Beyond Band of Brothers: The War Memoirs of Major Dick Winters
“Years from now I'll look back and remember today as the day I met him. I'll look back and remember the exact moment my life began to include him. I will remember it forever.”
― Cate Tiernan, quote from Sweep: Volume 1
“And the pleasures and rewards of the intellect are inseparable from angst, uncertainty, conflict and even despair.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from Letters to a Young Contrarian
“Or maybe the ugliness is in us.
That's just the way we are.
Underneath the pretense of civilization.”
― Bethany Griffin, quote from Masque of the Red Death
Lie Down in Darkness
The Storyteller's Da...
Johannes Cabal the N...
Tex
Stealing Harper
Clockwork AngelsBookQuoters 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.
