O. Henry Quotes

The true adventurer goes forth aimless and uncalculating to meet and greet unknown fate. A fine example was the Prodigal Son — when he started back home.

Jimmy Valentine looked into her eyes, forgetting at once what he was. He became another man.

She started to try to cover the sad marks of what she had done. Love and large-hearted giving, when added together, can leave deep marks. It is never easy to cover these marks, dear friends, never easy.

"You sold a story last week," said Pettit, "about a gun fight in an Arizona mining town in which the hero drew his Colt's .45 and shot seven bandits as fast as they came in the door. Now, if a six-shooter could — "

"Oh, well," said I, "that's different. Arizona is a long way from New York. I could have a man stabbed with a lariat or chased by a pair of chaparreras if I wanted to, and it wouldn't be noticed until the usual error-sharp from around McAdams Junction isolates the erratum and writes in to the papers about it." (from "The Plutonian Fire")

Онези майстори на ласото, чиито имена бяха взели жени, не бяха чак толкова ограничени във възможностите си да се освобождават от излишния капитал. В гърдите на създадения от реброто Адамово пол може да дреме с години дарбата да олекотява кесията, но никога, братя мои, никога тя не угасва напълно.

Jeff is in the line of unillegal graft. He is not to be dreaded by widows and orphans; he is a reducer of surplusage. His favorite disguise is that of the target-bird at which the spendthrift or the reckless investor may shy a few inconsequential dollars. He is readily vocalized by tobacco; so, with the aid of two thick and easy-burning brevas, I got the story of his latest Autolycan adventure.

Turn up the lights. I don't want to go home in the dark.

It did not exactly beggar description, but it certainly had that word on the lookout for the mendicancy squad.

I'll give you the whole secret to short story writing. Here it is. Rule 1: Write stories that please yourself. There is no Rule 2.

"We are grown stiff with the ramrod of convention down our backs.

Наша спина, вечно подпираемая железным каркасом условностей, давно закостенела.

(O. Henry, "The Green Door")"

It couldn't have happened anywhere but in little old New York.

Bohemia is nothing more than the little country in which you do not live. If you try to obtain citizenship in it, at once the court and retinue pack the royal archives and treasure and move away beyond the hills.

Pull up the shades so I can see New York. I don't want to go home in the dark.

Greenwich Village... the village of low rents and high arts.

What is the world at its best but a little round field of the moving pictures with two walking together in it?