Jack Kerouac Quotes

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“The closer you get to real matter, rock air fire and wood, boy, the more spiritual the world is.”

“Ah, life is a gate, a way, a path to Paradise anyway, why not live for fun and joy and love or some sort of girl by a fireside, why not go to your desire and LAUGH…”

“I just won't sleep," I decided. There were so many other interesting things to do.”

“I promise I shall never give up, and that I'll die yelling and laughing, and that until then I'll rush around this world I insist is holy and pull at everyone's lapel and make them confess to me and to all.”

“I hope it is true that a man can die and yet not only live in others but give them life, and not only life but that great consciousness of life.”

“The fact that everybody in the world dreams every night ties all mankind together.”

“They build their own Hells.”

“LA is the loneliest and most brutal of American cities; NY gets god-awful cold in the winter but there's a feeling of wacky comradeship somewhere in some streets. LA is a jungle.”

“My eyes were glued on life
and they were full of tears.”

“Better to sleep in an uncomfortable bed free, than sleep in a comfortable bed unfree.”

“But, outside of being a sweet little girl, she was awfully dumb and capable of doing horrible things.”

“It'll take you eternities to get rid of me,' she adds sadly, which makes me jealous, I want her to say I'll never get rid of her - I wanta be chased till eternity till I catch her.”

“Sure baby, mañana. It was always mañana. For the next few weeks that was all I heard––mañana a lovely word and one that probably means heaven.”

“For the first time in my life the weather was not something that touched me, that caressed me, froze or sweated me, but became me.”

“Forgive everyone for your own sins and be sure to tell them you love them which you do.”

“There are worse things than being mad.”

“The beauty of things must be that they end.”

“Ah, it was a fine night, a warm night, a wine-drinking night, a moony night, and a night to hug your girl and talk and spit and be heavengoing.”

“Let nature do the freezing and frightening and isolating in this world. let men work and love and fight it off.”

“And when the fog's over and the stars and the moon come out at night it'll be a beautiful sight.”

“My manners, abominable at times, can be sweet. As I grew older I became a drunk. Why? Because I like ecstasy of the mind. I'm a wretch. But I love, love.”

“The details are the life of it, I insist, say everything on your mind, don’t hold back, don’t analyze or anything as you go along, say it out.”

“All he needed was a wheel in his hand and four on the road.”

“… we all must admit that everything is fine and there's no need in the world to worry, and in fact we should realize what it would mean to us to UNDERSTAND that we're not REALLY worried about ANYTHING.”

“Roaring dreams take place in a perfectly silent mind. Now that we know this, throw the raft away.”

“When you've understood this scripture, throw it away. If you can't understand this scripture, throw it away. I insist on your freedom.”

“Pretty girls make graves.”

“I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you.”

“Bee, why are you staring at me? I am not a flower??”

“As we crossed the Colorado-Utah border I saw God in the sky in the form of huge gold sunburning clouds above the desert that seemed to point a finger at me and say, "Pass here and go on, you're on the road to heaven.”

“You'd be surprised how little I knew even up to yesterday”

“Love is all.”

“What difference does it make after all? — anonymity in the world of men is better than fame in heaven, for what's heaven? what's earth? All in the mind.”

“It was a rainy night. It was the myth of a rainy night.”

“all I wanted to do was sneak out into the night and disappear somewhere, and go and find out what everybody was doing all over the country.”

“The road must eventually lead to the whole world.”

“The empty blue sky of space says 'All this comes back to me, then goes again, and comes back again, then goes again, and I don't care, it still belongs to me”

“It's good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies”

“The silence was an intense roar.”

“and don't you know that God is Pooh Bear?”

“Aw I don't wanta go to no such thing, I just wanta drink in alleys.'…
But you'll miss all that, just for some old wine.'
There's wisdom in wine, goddam it!' I yelled. 'Have a shot!”

“Prison is where you promise yourself the right to live.”

“And I said, 'That last thing is what you can't get, Carlo. Nobody can get to that last thing. We keep on living in hopes of catching it once and for all.”

“It no longer makes me cry and die and tear myself to see her go because everything goes away from me like that now”

“I want to marry a [guy], so i can rest my soul with [him] till we both get old. This can't go on all the time-- all this franticness and jumping around. We've got to go someplace, find something.”

“I'm right there, swimming the river of hardships but I know how to swim…”

“my karma was to be born in America where nobody has any fun or believes in anything, especially freedom.”

“I didn't know what to say. I felt like crying, Goddammit everybody in the world wants an explanation for your acts and for your very being.”

“I want to work in revelations, not just spin silly tales for money. I want to fish as deep down as possible into my own subconscious in the belief that once that far down, everyone will understand because they are the same that far down.”