Quotessence
Home / Authors / Norman Mailer
Norman Mailer

Norman Mailer Quotes

Novelist

Filter quotes by topic

AllMenWritingLiteratureIfsPeopleThinkingWarWayLittlesWorld

Famous Norman Mailer Quotes

“Three miles long and two streets wide, the town curls around the bay ... a gaudy run with Mediterranean splashes of color, crowded steep-pitched roofs, fishing piers and fishing boats whose stench of mackerel and gasoline is as aphrodisiac to the sensuous nose as the clean bar-whisky smell of a nightclub where call girls congregate.”

LongTwoRunningGirlThreeSeaStreetsColorRiversTownsCleanFishesSmellWideMilesBarsBoatNosesLakesFishingRoofCrowdedCurlsGasolineSteepWhiskySensuousNightclubsAphrodisiacGaudyPiersFishing BoatsMackerel
Book:Advertisements for Myself
Create image

“The White Protestant's ultimate sympathy must be with science, factology, and committee rather than with sex, birth, heat, flesh, creation, the sweet and the funky; they must vote, manipulate, control, and direct, these Protestants who are the center of power in our land, they must go for what they believe is reason when it is only the Square logic of the past.”

BelieveReasonPastSexWhiteLandCreationSweetBirthDirectLogicVoteUltimateFleshHeatSquaresCommitteesManipulateProtestantsProtestantismFunky
Author:Norman Mailer
Create image

“The century would seek to dominate nature as it had never been dominated, would attack the idea of war, poverty and natural catastrophe as never before. The century would create death, devastation and pollution as never before. Yet the century was now attached to the idea that man must take his conception of life out to the stars.”

MenIdeasWarStarsNaturalPovertyCenturyConceptionPollutionCatastropheExplorersDevastation
Book:Of A Fire On The Moon
Create image

“I really gave up being passionate about politics 10, 15, 20 years ago, because I think finally that there were forces in the country that are larger than politics itself. And so I find it a fascinating game, this wonderful stuff goes on in terms of watching the game. But If you get to down it, look, I`m going to root for someone, I`ll root at a football game, not for politicians.”

IfsThinkingYearsLooksCountryGamesForceStuffTermWonderfulFootballGoes OnPoliticianYears AgoRootsPassionateFascinatingGave UpFootball Game
Author:Norman Mailer
Create image

“I don't trust compliments. I've been getting them for years. Sometimes I deserve them, sometimes I didn't. But generally when people give you compliments there's one of two things wrong with them. Either they're false, or what's worse is they're sincere. They really mean the compliment. And then they're offering you their loyalty. And I'm kind of a stingy... Well, I don't necessarily want to give all that loyalty back. So either way, let's skip the compliments.”

PeopleWayWantGivingYearsWellsKindMeanTwoSometimesDeserveLoyaltyTwo ThingsSincereComplimentOfferingReally MeanDon't TrustSkipStingy
Author:Norman Mailer
Create image

“A nation fights well in proportion to the amount of men and materials it has. And the other equation is that the individual soldier in that army is a more effective soldier the poorer his standard of living has been in the past.”

MenWellsHas BeensWarPastFightingIndividualNationsMaterialsAmountStandardsArmySoldierProportionEquationsStandards Of Living
Book:The Naked and the Dead: 50th Anniversary Edition, With a New Introduction by the Author
Create image