Quotes from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?

Raymond Carver ·  181 pages

Rating: (11.3K votes)


“He wondered if she wondered if he were watching her.”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?


“Ralph also took some classes in philosophy and literature and felt himself on the brink of some kind of huge discovery about himself. But it never came.”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?


“It is August.
My life is going to change. I feel it.”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?


“I lifted him out. I held him. I held that half of him.”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?


“You’ll be surprised to see what can collect in a mattress over the months, over the years. Every day, every night of our lives, we’re leaving little bits of ourselves, flakes of this and that, behind. Where do they go, these bits and pieces of ourselves? Right through the sheets and into the mattress, that’s where! Pillows, too. It’s all the same. He”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?



“You sound like a nice man,” the woman said. “Do I? Well, that’s nice of you to say.” He knew he should hang up now, but it was good to hear a voice, even his own, in the quiet room.”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?


“Though he continued to take classes here and there in the sciences and in business, Ralph also took some classes in philosophy and literature and felt himself on the brink of some kind of huge discovery about himself. But it never came.”
― Raymond Carver, quote from Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?


About the author

Raymond Carver
Born place: in Clatskanie, Oregon, The United States
Born date May 25, 1938
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“When you were steadily dating a boy, as she was Reeve, and this was known to everybody, it freed you up to be friends with boys.”
― Caroline B. Cooney, quote from The Voice on the Radio


“Getting rid of the concept of self is the work of all meditators, because suffering is born from this concept.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, quote from You Are Here: Discovering the Magic of the Present Moment


“While I have the floor, here's a question that's been bothering me for some time. Why do so few writers of heroic or epic fantasy ever deal with the fundamental quandary of their novels . . . that so many of them take place in cultures that are rigid, hierarchical, stratified, and in essence oppressive? What is so appealing about feudalism, that so many free citizens of an educated commonwealth like ours love reading about and picturing life under hereditary lords?

Why should the deposed prince or princess in every clichéd tale be chosen to lead the quest against the Dark Lord? Why not elect a new leader by merit, instead of clinging to the inbred scions of a failed royal line? Why not ask the pompous, patronizing, "good" wizard for something useful, such as flush toilets, movable type, or electricity for every home in the kingdom? Given half a chance, the sons and daughters of peasants would rather not grow up to be servants. It seems bizarre for modern folk to pine for a way of life our ancestors rightfully fought desperately to escape.”
― David Brin, quote from Glory Season


“At the ripe old age of seventeen, Donna had decided that "happily ever after" didn't exist for freaks like her.”
― Karen Mahoney, quote from The Iron Witch


“Nobody knows anything...... Not one person in the entire motion picture field knows for a certainty what's going to work. Every time out it's a guess and, if you're lucky, an educated one.”
― William Goldman, quote from Adventures in the Screen Trade


Interesting books

Into the Dark Lands
(1.5K)
Into the Dark Lands
by Michelle Sagara West
Parasite Rex: Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures
(4.1K)
Parasite Rex: Inside...
by Carl Zimmer
The Culture of Make Believe
(1.7K)
The Culture of Make...
by Derrick Jensen
Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships
(10K)
Social Intelligence:...
by Daniel Goleman
The Chill
(2.8K)
The Chill
by Ross Macdonald
The Fuck-Up
(9.7K)
The Fuck-Up
by Arthur Nersesian

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.