Quotessence
Home / Authors / Raymond Chandler
Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler Quotes

Novelist

Filter quotes by topic

AllWritingIfsMenArtBig SleepWayPeopleLittlesBookKindMeanDetectivesHollywoodKnowsLongThinkingHardMayWorldGuy

Famous Raymond Chandler Quotes

“I'm a very smart guy. I haven't a feeling or a scruple in the world. All I have the itch for is money. I am so money greedy that for twenty-five bucks a day and expenses, mostly gasoline and whisky, I do my thinking myself, what there is of it; I risk my whole future, the hatred of the cops . . . I dodge bullets and eat saps, and say thank you very much, if you have any more trouble, I hope you'll think of me, I'll just leave one of my cards in case anything comes up.”

IfsThinkingWorldWholeFeelingsGuyCasesFiveRiskTroubleHavensSmartHatredTwentiesCome UpCardsExpensesCopBulletsGreedyBucksTwenty FiveThink Of MeGasolineSapSaying Thank YouVery SmartWhiskyDodgeScruplesSmart Guy
Author:Raymond Chandler
Create image

“So by all means let's have a television show quick and long, even if the commercial has to be delivered by a man in a white coat with a stethoscope hanging around his neck, selling ergot pills. After all the public is entitled to what it wants, isn't it? The Romans knew that and even they lasted four hundred years after they started to putrefy.”

IfsMenWantYearsMeanLongShowsWhiteFourTelevisionHundredSellingNecksEntitledCoatsPillsTelevision ShowsHanging AroundStethoscopeWhite Coat
Book:Raymond Chandler Speaking
Create image

“May I wish for you the knowledge...that marriages do not take place, they are made by hand; that there is always an element of discipline involved; that however perfect the honeymoon, the time will come, however brief it is, when you wish she would fall downstairs and break a leg. This goes for her too. But the mood will pass, if you give it time.”

IfsGivingMayMadeHandsFallWishPerfectBreakDisciplineInvolvedElementsLegsMoodFalling DownHoneymoonBreak A Leg
Author:Raymond Chandler
Create image

“Common sense is the guy who tells you that you ought to have had your brakes relined last week before you smashed a front end this week. Common sense is the Monday morning quarterback who could have won the ball game if he had been on the team. But he never is. He's high up in the stands with a flask on his hip. Common sense is the little man in a grey suit who never makes a mistake in addition. But it's always someone else's money he's adding up.”

IfsMenLittlesEndsLastsGuyGamesCommonMistakeMorningWeekTeamFrontsOughtBallsCommon SenseSuitsHipsGreyMondayQuarterbackMonday MorningBrakeLittle ManBall GamesFlasks
Author:Raymond Chandler
Create image

“There's always something to do if you don't have to work or consider the cost. It's no real fun but the rich don't know that. They never had any. They never want anything very hard except maybe somebody else's wife and that's a pretty pale desire compared with the way a plumber's wife wants new curtains for the living room.”

IfsKnowsWayWantRealHardDesireFunRoomsRichWifeCostPaleCurtainsLiving RoomPlumber
Book:The Long Goodbye: A Novel
Create image

“I'm a licensed private investigator and have been for quite a while. I'm a lone wolf, unmarried, getting middle-aged, and not rich. I've been in jail more than once and I don't do divorce business. I like liquor and women and chess and a few other things. The cops don't like me too well, but I know a couple I get along with. I'm a native son, born in Santa Rosa, both parents dead, no brothers or sisters, and when I get knocked off in a dark alley sometime, if it happens, as it could to anyone in my business, nobody will feel that the bottom has dropped out of his or her life.”

IfsKnowsFeelsWellsHas BeensHappensParentBornDarkRichMiddleSonBrotherCoupleBottomDivorceChessLike MeNativeJailCopSantaLiquorAlleysLoneMiddle AgedUnmarriedInvestigatorsRosaDon't Like MeLone WolfDark AlleysNative Son
Book:The Long Goodbye: A Novel
Create image

“The motion picture is like a picture of a lady in a half-piece bathing suit. If she wore a few more clothes, you might be intrigued. If she wore no clothes at all, you might be shocked. But the way it is, you are occupied with noticing that her knees are too bony and that her toenails are too large. The modern film tries too hard to be real. Its techniques of illusion are so perfect that it requires no contribution from the audience but a mouthful of popcorn.”

IfsWayTryingRealHardMightFilmPerfectHalfAudiencePiecesModernClothesIllusionTechniqueSuitsKneesContributionBeing RealShockedNoticingIntriguedPopcornMotion PicturesBathingBathing SuitsToenails
Book:Raymond Chandler Speaking
Create image

“Throughout the history of commercial life nobody has ever quite liked the commission man. His function is too vague, his presence always seems one too many, his profit looks too easy, and even when you admit that he has a necessary function, you feel that this function is, as it were, a personification of something that in an ethical society would not need to exist. If people could deal with one another honestly, they would not need agents.”

PeopleIfsMenNeedsFeelsLooksSeemsFunnyEasyDealsHumourFunctionProfitHonestlyAgentsEthicalVaguePersonification
Author:Raymond Chandler
Create image

“Undoubtedly the stories about them [hard-boiled detectives] had a fantastic element. Such things happened, but not so rapidly, nor to so close-knit a group of people, nor within so narrow a frame of logic. This was inevitable because the demand was for constant action; if you stopped to think you were lost. When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand.”

PeopleIfsThinkingMenHardStoriesHandsActionLostDoubtHappenedDoorsGroupsDemandElementsGunLogicConstantThings HappenFantasticInevitableDetectivesWhen In Doubt
Author:Raymond Chandler
Create image

“It's fairly obvious that American education is a cultural flop. Americans are not a well-educated people culturally, and their vocational education often has to be learned all over again after they leave school and college. On the other hand, they have open quick minds and if their education has little sharp positive value, it has not the stultifying effects of a more rigid training.”

PeopleIfsMindWellsLittlesHandsSchoolAmericaValuesEducationEffectsCollegeTrainingObviousEducatedWell EducatedAmerican EducationVocational EducationPositive Values
Book:The Raymond Chandler Papers: Selected Letters and Nonfiction, 1909-1959
Create image