Quotes by Stephen King

Fighting for peace, is like f***ing for chastity

Do they see the lethal insanity of a race to the brink of oblivion, and then over the edge? Apparently not. If they did, surely they wouldnt be racing to begin with. Or is it a simple failure of imagination? One doesnt like to think such a rudimentary failing could bring about the end, yet...

... it would matter ... to the tens of thousands of young Americans ... who would ... be invited to put on uniforms, fly to the other side of the world, spread their nether cheeks, and sit down on the big green dildo that was Vietnam.

And the shooting will happen so fast and be over so quick that youll wonder what all the planning and palaver was for, when in the end it always comes down to the same five minutes worth of blood, pain, and stupidity.

Like all sweet dreams, it will be brief, but brevity makes sweetness, doesnt it?

You grew up, became a man, had to adjust to taking less than you hoped for; you discovered the dream-machine had a big OUT OF ORDER sign on it.

The eyes were damned, the staring, glaring eyes of one who sees but does not see, eyes ever turned inward to the sterile hell of dreams beyond control, dreams unleashed, risen out of the stinking swamps of the unconscious.

Come on, Doctor... we got places to go.

Dreams, after all, are insubstantial things, like mist itself.

I think that, even if we forget each other, well remember in our dreams.

In nightmares we can think the worst. Thats what theyre for, I guess.

Dreams are a simple psychological emetic, and people who have them are more blessed than cursed

In here Im the guy who can get things for you... outside all you need is the Yellow Pages. I dont think I could make it.

Some birds are not meant to be caged, thats all. Their feathers are too bright, their songs too sweet and wild.

He’s my cat! He’s not God’s cat! Let God have his own cat! Let God have all the damn old cats He wants, and kill them all! Church is mine!

Anyway, as the old barrelhouse song says, My God, how the money rolled in. Norton must have subscribed to the old Puritan notion that the best way to figure out which folks God favours is by checking their bank acounts.

Mr Gray didnt care much for Jonesys body (or so he told himself; in truth it was hard not to feel at least some affection for something capable of providing such unexpected pleasures as bacon and murder), but it did have to take him another couple of hundred miles.

Put your vocabulary on the top shelf of your toolbox, and dont make any conscious effort to improve it... One of the really bad things you can do to your writing is to dress up the vocabulary, looking for long words because youre maybe a little bit ashamed of your shot ones. This is like dressing up a household pet in evening clothes. The pet is embarrassed and the person who committed this act of pre-meditated cuteness should be even more embarrassed. Make yourself a solemn promise right now that youll never use emolument when you mean tip and youll never say John stopped long enough to perform an act of excretion when you mean John stopped long enough to take a shit. If you believe take a shit would be considered offensive or inappropriate by your audience, feel free to say John stopped long enough to move his bowels...

He was a poet who sometimes taught Free University classes or travelled in the western states of Utah, Nevada, and Arizona, speaking to high school English classes, stunning middle-class boys and girls (he hoped) with the news that poetry was alive—narcoleptic, to be sure, but still possessed of a certain hideous vitality.

For God’s sake, Larry, grow up. Develop a little self-righteousness. A lot of that is an ugly thing, God knows, but a little applied over all your scruples is an absolute necessity! It is to the soul what a good sunblock is to the skin during the heat of the summer. You can only captain your own soul, and from time to time some smart-ass psychologist will question your ability to even do that.