You can't tell a doper well under control from a vegetarian book-keeper. Raymond Chandler More Quotes by Raymond Chandler More Quotes From Raymond Chandler There are people who can write their memoirs with a reasonable amount of honesty, and there are people who simply cannot take themselves seriously enough. I think I might be the first to admit that the sort of reticence which prevents a man from exploiting his own personality is really an inverted sort of egotism. Raymond Chandler honestywritingmen 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. Raymond Chandler realperfecttrying You can't have everything, even in California Raymond Chandler californiainspiration Good critical writing is measured by the perception and evaluation of the subject; bad critical writing by the necessity of maintaining the professional standing of the critic. Raymond Chandler perceptioncriticismwriting Such is the brutalization of commercial ethics in this country that no one can feel anything more delicate than the velvet touch of a soft buck. Raymond Chandler velvetbusinesscountry What greater prestige can a man like me (not too gifted, but very understanding) have than to have taken a cheap, shoddy and utterly lost kind of writing, and have made of it something that intellectuals claw each other about? Raymond Chandler takenwritingmen In jail a man has no personality. He is a minor disposal problem and a few entries on reports. Nobody cares who loves or hates him, what he looks like, what he did with his life. Nobody reacts to him unless he gives trouble. Nobody abuses him. All that is asked of him is that he go quietly to the right cell and remain quiet when he gets there. There is nothing to fight against, nothing to be mad at. The jailers are quiet men without animosity or sadism. All this stuff you read about men yelling and screaming, beating against the bars, running spoons along them, guards rushing in with clubs -- all that is for the big house. A good jail is one of the quietest places in the world. Life in jail is in suspension. Raymond Chandler When in doubt, have two guys come through the door with guns. Raymond Chandler Common sense always speaks too late. Common sense is the guy who tells 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 gray suit who never makes a mistake in addition. But it's always somebody else's money he's adding up. Raymond Chandler He didn't know the right people. That's all a police record means in this rotten crime-ridden country. Raymond Chandler Woe, woe, woe... in a little while we shall all be dead. Therefore let us behave as though we were dead already. Raymond Chandler The streets were dark with something more than night. Raymond Chandler moresomethingdarknight
