“Some people are born mediocre, some people achieve mediocrity, and some people have mediocrity thrust upon them.”
“I want to keep my dreams, even bad ones, because without them, I might have nothing all night long.”
“Destiny is a good thing to accept when it’s going your way. When it isn’t, don’t call it destiny; call it injustice, treachery, or simple bad luck.”
“We do have a zeal for laughter in most situations, give or take a dentist.”
“Rise above principle and do what’s right.”
“When I grow up I want to be a little boy.”
“I had examined myself pretty thoroughly and discovered that I was unfit for military service.”
“Peace on earth would mean the end of civilization as we know it.”
“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn’t have to; but if he didn’t want to he was sane and had to.”
“The enemy is anybody who’s going to get you killed, no matter which side he’s on.”
“Every writer I know has trouble writing.”
“I think in every country that there is at least one executive who is scared of going crazy.”
“Frankly, I’d like to see the government get out of war altogether and leave the whole field to private industry.”
“He was a self-made man who owed his lack of success to nobody.”
“He had decided to live forever or die in the attempt.”
“When I read something saying I’ve not done anything as good as ‘Catch-22’ I’m tempted to reply, ‘Who has?’”
“But that was war. Just about all he could find in its favor was that it paid well and liberated children from the pernicious influence of their parents.”
“He knew everything about literature except how to enjoy it.”
“Hungry Joe collected lists of fatal diseases and arranged them in alphabetical order so that he could put his finger without delay on any one he wanted to worry about.”
“I’d like to see the government get out of war altogether and leave the whole field to private individuals.”
“I don’t believe in miracles because it’s been a long time since we’ve had any.”
“Never quit a job as a matter of principle. You’ll always regret it.”
“The villains will come along. There were plenty in the Carter administration, and there will be plenty with Reagan.”
“The idea of using actual clippings came about as a way of characterizing Gold. Gold uses clippings because he hates doing research and is not even really interested in the books and articles he writes.”
“I think Haig will be foolish, but perhaps not quite as foolish as Kissinger was, because Haig doesn’t have the education Kissinger had. Haig is a little more dangerous because, I fear, he believes what he says, whereas I never got that impression from Kissinger.”
“I’ve adjusted to this, that my books are not going to get unanimously good reviews.”
“All of my books deal in a very rough, rude fashion with subjects about which there are great conflicts of opinion.”
“I do not have, and never had, any interest in either the Bible or religion.”
“I’ve only had four ideas for a novel in my life, and I’ve written all of them.”
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