quotes from the book which the movie is based on...

If you liked the movie a bit then I am sure you will just love the book. Some excerpts from the book


The human cock, I reflected, is the most honest part of man. I guess the human *beep* is the same, though I’m considerably less sure of that. The cock I know more about. The great thing about it, the thing that makes it so completely moral, is that it doesn't pretend to any morality.

For instance, I thought , the cock would never use the words “ought to”. And never the word “should”. Right there what a load to lose! All the Bird knows is “I want”. Or to be more exact, “Now I want.”None of that forever and ever *beep* has brought more people to early decay that any other sentiment. As well as to destructive acts against their fellow men and women. Most evil is done in the name of the good.

I WANT!

Come to think of it, that phrase, “I want” expressed precisely the humanness I had lost. I simply didn’t know what I wanted anymore. I couldnt make a choice;I was swamped in unresolved boths. I was not doing anything for the simple reason that I wanted to. The simple,pure, direct , human downright babyish “I want” – where had that gone?

Long lost. I sat there on the top of those steps and I thought, long gone,I’d lost the knack. I’d killed the gift.I didnt know what I wanted anymore.I felt only that I must do this and should do that and I was expected to such and such and it was my duty to perform this-a-way and my obligation to see this thing through, and it was demanded of met o fulfill—always what other people wanted of me…

The worst of it was a whole other set of imperatives that I had allowed myself to become subject to. These were the Expedients. Again not what I wanted , but what was useful at a certain time in any sitution.”Expedient”. The word written on the tomb of our generation. They did what was expedient.

….Here’s another thing I respect about the Joint. You cant make him get up and pretend.If he doesnt want to, you can beat him and scold him, but he won’t go. El conquistador will lie there and sulk. A soft-on is a reproach to its owner. It says, you are lying, kid. Later when the false occasion has passed into history the member will sit up and look around , then stand up pretty as a tulip and say like the comedian ,”wha’ hoppen??”

Not that the root has to want a lot.But it has to genuinely want some.On the one hand he doesnt need, nor does he fall for,that noone but you *beep* point of view on the subject might be expressed thus: Quote. You neurotic son of a bitch ,why must you pretend or require that all desire be perfect ,complete, and forever? Or the greatest? The girls made up that “forever” *beep* and that greatest *beep* and “only-you” *beep* over the centuries to protect their fading years. You cant blame the girls fort hat. Their fading is facts. But why do you pretend? Close quote.

Now they say a stiff prick has no conscience. But let’s face it. It’s the honest part of us all,men. And the most democratic.It doesnt differentiate between rich and poor, and it draws no colour line.

….Old one eye, like all pure things, tends to be naive.And whenever you find something pure and naive you also find someone trying to corrupt it. So the Mindless One is often the unconscious tool (and victim) of the corrupt mind and the spirit of the person to whom he is attached.Men try to use their better part in so many ways they shouldn’t. To put girls down, to put other men down, to show off, to bully, to compete, to make up for their defeats in other arenas, to revenge themselves, to collect scalps, and one of the worst, to satisfy idle curiosity. God knows there are hundreds of variations of perversion.Like the very ethical, very famous public figure I know who could do it to his wife only when she was asleep. We take out so many of our sicknesses through our little friend. But you cant finally corrupt the Shiny-Headed One. He will come back, see something he wants, and just naturally go for it. What could finally be more innocent?

….An honest person lives in vulnerability. The rest of us doesn’t care.

….Reared as she had been in the old world of tradition of complete subservience to her husband,she had faithfully done everything expected of her. She had submitted to his embraces,borne his children, cooked his dinners,done his laundry,cleaned his house,entertained his guests,played out her fate as best as she knew how, given her whole life. In every particular she had been perfect. Except one. It was my mother who plotted with me not to go into my father’s business. She broke the walls of the Greek ghetto for me, encouraged me to reach out into America.When I was fifteen or sixteen , it was she who made me feel that….I could do anything I really wanted to… In those days she was married to a man who got out of the bed every morning to make money. Even his diversions the horses and the cards were a continuation in play of the obsession of his life: beating the other guy to the dollar. That was his life, and he was so un-self-questioning and single-minded about it that he had the force of an ocean wave. So, to save her life, she had to learn how water fights water. She soon knew that if she stood up and opposed him head-on she would be battered to pieces. But if she resisted as water resists – by yielding , waiting for the crusher to pass then returning to pass, then returning to the same place –in that way persisting she could as she in time did-, finally gain her objectives. …. It was from her that I learned the efficacy of silence. It was from her that I put a smoke screen of indifference around the objectives I wanted most,play it cool..

…. “Eee” said my mother, “I don’t complain against him. I always had enough to eat, he didn’t run with other women, and every night he came home. What else could I ask?”

I said nothing. What else could she have asked?! “Many women have worse” she sighed as if in relief.
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