Jack London Quotes

1876–1916 United States

John Griffith "Jack" London (born John Griffith Chaney, January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916) was an American novelist, journalist, and social activist.

United States
Activists
Journalists
Novelists
Short story writers

Also known as: London, Jack, Martin Eden, The Iron Heel

Random Jack London quote

40 quotes

Life is not always a matter of holding good cards, but sometimes, playing a poor hand well.

Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior (1991)

Life achieves its summit when it does to the uttermost that which it was equipped to do.

White Fang (1906)

A bone to the dog is not charity. Charity is the bone shared with the dog when you are just as hungry as the dog.

The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.

A good joke will sell quicker than a good poem, and, measured in sweat and blood, will bring better remuneration.

He does not lose anything, for with the loss of himself he loses the knowledge of loss.

The Sea-Wolf (1904)

Too much is written by the men who can't write about the men who do write.

Martin Eden (1909)

The great driving force of the oligarchs is the belief that they are doing right.

The Iron Heel (1907)

Age is never so old as youth would measure it.

Don't loaf and invite inspiration; light out after it with a club, and if you don't get it you will nonetheless get something that looks remarkably like it.

The loneliness of the man is slowly being borne in upon me. There is not a man aboard but hates or fears him, nor is there a man whom he does not despise.

The Sea-Wolf (1904)

Men do not knowingly drink for the effect alcohol produces on the body. What they drink for is the brain-effect; and if it must come through the body, so much the worse for the body.

John Barleycorn (1913)

I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Who are they who speak evil of the clay? The very stars are made of clay like mine!

"Let beauty be your end. Why should you mint beauty into gold? Anyway, you can’t."

Martin Eden (1909)

Judge them by their works. What have they done for mankind beyond the spinning of airy fancies and the mistaking of their own shadows for gods?

The Iron Heel (1907)

My first thought was that a man who had come through a collision and rubbed shoulders with death merited more attention than I received.

The Sea-Wolf (1904)

Hist, now, between you an' meself and the stanchion there, this Wolf Larsen is a regular devil, an' the Ghost'll be a hell ship like she's always been since he had hold iv her.

The Sea-Wolf (1904)

There are things greater than our wisdom, beyond our justice. The right and wrong of this we cannot say, and it is not for us to judge.

He lacked the wisdom, and the only way for him to get it was to buy it with his youth; and when wisdom was his, youth would have been spent buying it.

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Jack London (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.