“Let me tell you something. A man ain’t a goddamn ax. Chopping, hacking, busting every goddamn minute of the day. Things get to him. Things he can’t chop down because they’re inside.”

—  Toni Morrison, book Beloved

Source: Beloved

Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Let me tell you something. A man ain’t a goddamn ax. Chopping, hacking, busting every goddamn minute of the day. Things…" by Toni Morrison?
Toni Morrison photo
Toni Morrison184
American writer 1931–2019

Related quotes

J.M. Coetzee photo

“A book should be an axe to chop open the frozen sea inside us.”

J.M. Coetzee book Summertime

Source: Summertime

Abraham Lincoln photo

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Variant: If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend six hours sharpening my ax.

“"So you'll be wanting all these hydrangeas chopped down, then?"
"Whatever for?" Charmain said.
"I like to chop things down," the kobold explained. "Chief pleasure of gardening."”

Diana Wynne Jones (1934–2011) English children's fantasy writer

Source: Castle Series, House of Many Ways (2008), p. 57.

Dane Cook photo

“I hope when he dies, he does become a tree. I hope he's in the middle of the wilderness and he's doing his tree thing. Whatever it is trees do. I know they do a lot of work with breezes. And wouldn't it be fantastic if while he was out there just enjoying his treeness, through the woods, a huge sweaty guy with an ax comes long? Sees him… [tree-chopping motions]. Chops him down, smash! Put a chain around him, drag him through the mud and the muck, throw him into a sawmill and grind him up. [Nuzzsaw noise] Then you pound him down into paper, and once he's paper, you print the Bible on him.”

Dane Cook (1972) American actor and comedian

Vicious Circle (2006)

D.H. Lawrence photo

“Instead of chopping yourself down to fit the world, chop the world down to fit yourself.”

D.H. Lawrence book Women in Love

Source: Women in Love

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan photo

“Every instigator or madman, who will dare to raise his hand against the government, let him be sure that the government will chop it off.”

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (1954) 12th President of Turkey from 2014

Speech delivered after the military coup, 2016

John Green photo

“It is so hard to leave—until you leave. And then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the world.”

John Green book Paper Towns

Quentin "Q" Jacobsen, p. 229
Paper Towns (2008)

Eminem photo

“There's no way I'll back down, like a goddamn coward. I can't, how would I look? As a man bowing to his knees? Like the mad cow disease, let somebody lash out at me, and not lash back out at him.”

Eminem (1972) American rapper and actor

"Don't Push Me", Get Rich or Die Tryin (2003).
2000s

Jack Johnson (musician) photo

“Inaudible melodies
Serve narrational strategies
Unobtrusive tones
Help to notice nothing but the zone
Of visual relevancy
Frame-lines tell me what to see
Chopping like an axe
Or maybe Eisenstein should just relax”

Jack Johnson (musician) (1975) American musician

Inaudible Melodies.
Song lyrics, Brushfire Fairytales (2001)

“As she shuffled back, he glanced down at the tent between his legs. Christ, that goddamn thing in there was huge; he looked like he had another arm in his pants.”

Jessica Bird (1969) U.S. novelist

Source: Lover Awakened

Related topics