“It is the heart of man that I am trying to imply in this work.”
Seventy Thousand Assyrians (1934)
William Saroyan: 190 quotes24 likes
William Saroyan Quotes
“All great art has madness, and quite a lot of bad art has it, too.”
My Heart's in the Highlands (1939)
“This is what drives a young writer out of his head, this feeling that nothing is being said.”
Seventy Thousand Assyrians (1934)
The Bicycle Rider In Beverly Hills (1952)
On Armenian poet Yegishe Charentz, whom Saroyan met in Moscow in June, 1935.
I Used to Believe I Had Forever — Now I'm Not So Sure (1968)
“I loved the theaters, and even though I was hungry, I never spent money for food.”
The Bicycle Rider In Beverly Hills (1952)
“There was a touch of anxiety in the whole human race about its future.”
First Visit to Armenia (1935)
Inhale and Exhale (1936), Antranik and the Spirit of Armenia
Hello Out There (1941)
The Bicycle Rider In Beverly Hills (1952)
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934), A Cold Day
Inhale and Exhale (1936), Antranik and the Spirit of Armenia
“Art is what is irresistible.”
Statement to William Bolcom, quoted in "The End of the Mannerist Century" (2004) by William Bolcom, in The Pleasure of Modernist Music edited by Arved Ashby ISBN 1580461433
Sons Come and Go, Mothers Hang in Forever (1976)
“The purpose of my life is to put off dying as long as possible.”
My Heart's in the Highlands (1939)
“It seemed to me that I had no right to burn a book I hadn't even read.”
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934), A Cold Day
Here Comes There Goes You Know Who (1961)
Here Comes There Goes You Know Who (1961)
As quoted in "Saroyan's Literary Quarantine" by Peter H. King, in The Los Angeles Times (26 March 1997).
Hello Out There (1941)
“The idiot is indeed the good man, but only because he doesn't know any better.”
Sons Come and Go, Mothers Hang in Forever (1976)
In the The Bicycle Rider In Beverly Hills (1952) Saroyan additionally wrote of Shaw:
He was a gentle, delicate, kind, little man who had established a pose, and then lived it so steadily and effectively that the pose had become real. Like myself, his nature has been obviously a deeply troubled one in the beginning. He had been a man who had seen the futility, meaninglessness and sorrow of life but had permitted himself to thrust aside these feelings and to perform another George Bernard Shaw, which is art and proper.
Hello Out There (1941)
“Art comes from the world, belongs to it, can never escape from it.”
My Heart's in the Highlands (1939)
Of his father, who died in William's infancy.
I Used to Believe I Had Forever — Now I'm Not So Sure (1968)
“A play is a world, with its own inhabitants and its own laws and its values.”
William Saroyan The Time of Your Life
The Time of Your Life (1939)
Sons Come and Go, Mothers Hang in Forever (1976)
“Each person belongs to the environment, in his own person, as himself.”
William Saroyan The Time of Your Life
The Time of Your Life (1939)
“What a lonely and silly thing it is to be an Armenian writer in America.”
"The Armenian Writers : A Short Story" (1954)
"The Beggars" in The William Saroyan Reader (1958)
“It is impossible not to notice that our world is tormented by failure, hate, guilt, and fear.”
Letter to Robert E. Sherwood (1946)
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (1934), A Cold Day
“If I want to do anything, I want to speak a more universal language.”
Seventy Thousand Assyrians (1934)
The Bicycle Rider In Beverly Hills (1952)
