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The perfect ideal would be that a man who is essentially nonviolent would be able to defend himself against any form of violence. But this is very rare in life.

— James Jones The Paris Review interview (1958)

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More quotes by James Jones

This is the song of the men who have no place, played by a man who has never had a place, and can therefore play it.

There's only a thin red line between the sane and the mad.

The Thin Red Line (1962)

If I get it, no one will ever know to what heights I might have gone as a writer. Maybe if you wrote about the promise that was there, all wouldn't be lost.

To Reach Eternity (1989)

Sometimes the air is awfully clear here. You can look off to sea and see the soft, warm, raggedy roof of clouds stretching on and on and on. It almost seems as if you can look right on into eternity.

To Reach Eternity (1989)

I want to make everybody in the world groan with the inevitability of sorrow.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: James Jones (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.