William Saroyan Quotes

You must not be unkind, especially when it happens that you're right.

I care so much about everything that I care about nothing

It seemed to me that I had no right to burn a book I hadn't even read.

Armenag Saroyan. A good man of whom the worst that anybody was willing to say, was that he was too good for this world.

Genius is play, and man's capacity for achieving genius is infinite, and many may achieve genius only through play.

Be, beget, begone.

I had in my soul the greatest truths to tell, but when I came to the work of telling them I couldn't do it.

"Whoever the kid had been, whoever had the grand attitude, has finally heeded the admonishment of parents, teachers, governments, religions, and the law: "You just change your attitude now please, young man." This transformation in kids — from flashing dragonflies, so to say, to sticky water-surface worms slowly slipping downstream — is noticed with pride by society and with mortification by God, which is a fantastic way of saying I don't like to see kids throw away their truth just because it isn't worth a dime in the open market."

I miss you of course and I think of you all the time. I am O.K., and even though I have never believed in wars - and know them to be foolish, even when they are necessary - I am proud that I am involved since so many others are, and this is what's happening. I do not recognize any enemy which is human, for no human being can be my enemy. Whoever he is, he is my friend. My quarrel is not with him, but with that unfortunate part of him which I seek to destroy in myself first.

Unless a man has pity he is not truly a man. If a man has not wept at the worlds pain he is only half a man, and there will always be pain in the world, knowing this does not mean that a man shall dispair. A good man will seek to take pain out of things. A foolish man will not even notice it, except in himself, and the poor unfortunate evil man will drive pain deeper into things and spread it about wherever he goes.

The order I found was the order of disorder

The role of art is to make a world which can be inhabited.

I have been vitally aware of the Law of Opposites, and this awareness has kept me reasonably serene... the drama of life... the play of truth. the quarrel of fools and frauds, male and female, the classic and the romantic, the disciplined and the free... the comic and the tragic contrasting of the opposites in all areas of possibility and on and on and on.

Նա գիտեր, որ տղան աչքեր ուներ և աչքերից ամն կողմ տեսողություն, իսկ տեսողությունից այն կողմ` սիրտ, զգացմունք, սեր` ոչ միայն մի բանի կամ մի տեսակ բանի հանդեպ, այլ որևէ բանի և ամեն ինչի հանդեպ:

A man's ethnic identity has more to do with a personal awareness than with geography.