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Quotations from Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler is one of the great American writers of the 20th Century. The fact that he wrote mostly genre crime fiction does nothing to diminish that accomplishment. Like many a great writer he used his art for social commentary, particularly on what he observed in Southern California.

Here are a selection of his quotes, both from his novels and his other works.

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List added by irishgit on 10/30/2009

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1

From 30 feet away she looked like a lot of class. From 10 feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from 30 feet away.

4.67 Stars | 3 ratings

2

He talks as the man of his age talks, that is, with rude wit, a lively sense of the grotesque, a disgust for sham, and a contempt for pettiness.

5.00 Stars | 2 ratings

3

Alcohol is like love. The first kiss is magic, the second is intimate, the third is routine. After that you take the girl's clothes off.

3.00 Stars | 4 ratings

4

A city with all the personality of a paper cup. (On Los Angeles)

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

5

An age which is incapable of poetry is incapable of any kind of literature except the cleverness of decadence.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

6

Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

7

He looked as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

8

I don't mind if you don't like my manners. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them during the long winter evenings.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

9

I like bars just after they open in the evening. When the air inside is still cool and clean and everything is shiny. The first quiet drink of the evening in a quiet bar -- that's wonderful

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

10

It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

11

It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

12

The English may not always be the best writers in the world, but they are incomparably the best dull writers.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

13

The voice dragged itself out of her throat like a sick man getting out of bed.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

14

When I split an infinitive, God damn it, I split it so it will stay split.

5.00 Stars | 1 ratings

15

Chess is as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you can find outside an advertising agency.

4.00 Stars | 1 ratings

16

He was a guy who talked with commas, like a heavy novel. Over the phone anyway

4.00 Stars | 1 ratings

17

I bent over and took hold of the room with both hands and spun it. When I had it nicely spinning I gave it a full swing and hit myself on the back of the head with the floor.

4.00 Stars | 1 ratings

18

The flood of print has turned reading into a process of gulping rather than savoring.

3.00 Stars | 1 ratings

19

"She's dark and lovely and passionate. And very, very kind." "And exclusive as a mailbox," I said.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

20

A good story cannot be devised; it has to be distilled.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

21

A nice state of affairs when a man has to indulge his vices by proxy

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

22

A really good detective never gets married.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

23

Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

24

And the commercials would have sickened a goat raised on barbed wire and broken beer bottles

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

25

As it is she will probably turn out to be one of these acid-faced virgins that sit behind little desks in public libraries and stamp dates in books.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

26

At least half the mystery novels published violate the law that the solution, once revealed, must seem to be inevitable.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

27

Everything a writer learns about the art or craft of fiction takes just a little away from his need or desire to write at all. In the end he knows all the tricks and has nothing to say.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

28

For a guy with a limited vocabulary, you sure do manage to get your point across.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

29

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.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

30

He didn't curl his lip because it had been curled when he came in.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

31

However toplofty and idealistic a man may be, he can always rationalize his right to earn money.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

32

I certainly admire people who do things

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

33

I do a great deal of research - particularly in the apartments of tall blondes.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

34

I guess God made Boston on a wet Sunday.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

35

I hung up. It was a step in the right direction, but it didn't go far enough. I ought to have locked the door and hid under the desk.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

36

I knew one thing: as soon as anyone said you didn't need a gun, you'd better take one along that worked.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

37

I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a gun

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

38

I think a man ought to get drunk at least twice a year just on principle, so he won't let himself get snotty about it.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

39

I was neat, clean, shaved and sober and I didn't care who knew it

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

40

I wasn't doing any work that day, just catching up on my foot-dangling.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

41

I'm all done with hating you. It's all washed out of me. I hate people hard, but I don't hate them very long.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

42

I'm an occasional drinker, the kind of guy who goes out for a beer and wakes up in Singapore with a full beard.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

43

If my books had been any worse, I should not have been invited to Hollywood, and if they had been any better, I should not have come.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

44

It is not a fragrant world.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

45

It is pretty obvious that the debasement of the human mind caused by a constant flow of fraudulent advertising is no trivial thing. There is more than one way to conquer a country.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

46

It seemed like a nice neighborhood to have bad habits in

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

47

It was a nice face, a face you get to like. Pretty, but not so pretty that you would have to wear brass knuckles every time you took it out.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

48

It's fairly obvious that American education is a cultural flop.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

49

Most critical writing is drivel and half of it is dishonest. It is a short cut to oblivion, anyway. Thinking in terms of ideas destroys the power to think in terms of emotions and sensations.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

50

She approached me with enough sex appeal to stampede a business men's lunch.

0.00 Stars | 0 ratings

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