9 quotes
I once read that the Devil studied Basque for seven years and only learned two words.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
I passed that off as women’s intuition, which is wrong more often than not. People remember the times it works and forget those it fails.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
The world is full of people who, if they got to Heaven, would complain about the tune of the harps and the dampness of the clouds.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
We rented an apartment in a rambly wooden-frame building, a block from the beach. This was before the waterfront sprouted a host of huge condominiums, like a plague of concrete mushrooms.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
There was no harder-boiled materialist than I; I rejected Marxism as too mystical and not materialistic enough.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
As you know, Monsieur Newbury, the civilization is but a thin crust over our savage interiors, no matter if our skins be white or black. We must try to keep this shell of egg intact.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
I fear me that the eighteenth century, which I have idealized all these years, never really existed. The real one was far dirtier, more narrow-minded, brutal, orthodox, and superstitious than I could have ever conceived without seeing it.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
But what argument could I offer? It was nothing but an irrational feeling—the kind of “premonition” we get from time to time but remember only on the rare occasions when it is fulfilled by the event. I had no evidence.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
It was hardly fair to his opponents, but I have never had much sympathy for the victims of gambling sharks. If they were not trying to get something for nothing, they would not expose themselves to being taken.
The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)