Quotes from Robert E. Howard

I have accomplished little enough, but such as it is, it is the result of my own efforts.

But the idea of a man making his living by writing seemed, in that hardy environment, so fantastic that even today I am sometimes myself assailed by a feeling of unreality.

Animals are neither gods nor fiends, but men in their way without the lust and greed of man.

Aye, you white dog, you are like all your race; but to a black man gold can never pay for blood.

Men are but men, and the greatest men are they who soonest learn the simpler things.

The sea-road is good for wanderers and landless men. There is quenching of thirst on the grey paths of the winds, and the flying clouds to still the sting of lost dreams.

What shall a man say when a friend has vanished behind the doors of Death? A mere tangle of barren words, only words.

No man can be convinced when he will not.

It is an ill thing to meet a man you thought dead in the woodland at dusk.

But not all men seek rest and peace; some are born with the spirit of the storm in their blood.

Don't you think that as a people, Americans have less poetry, real poetry, in their souls than any other nations?

How can I wear the harness of toilAnd sweat at the daily round, While in my soul foreverThe drums of Pictdom sound?

Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.

Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandaled feet.

Barbarianism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is the whim of circumstance. And barbarianism must ultimately triumph

What do I know of cultured ways, the gilt, the craft and the lie? I, who was born in a naked land and bred in the open sky. The subtle tongue, the sophist guile, they fail when the broadswords sing; Rush in and die, dogs—I was a man before I was a king.

The more I see of what you call civilization, the more highly I think of what you call savagery!

All fled—all done, so lift me on the pyre— The Feast is over, and the lamps expire.

I'm not going out of my way looking for devils; but I wouldn't step out of my path to let one go by.

Know, oh prince, that between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis and the gleaming cities, and the years of the rise of the Sons of Aryas, there was an Age undreamed of, when shining kingdoms lay spread across the world like blue mantles beneath the stars.

My characters are more like men than these real men are, see. They're rough and rude, they got hands and they got bellies. They hate and they lust; break the skin of civilization and you find the ape, roaring and red-handed.

I think the real reason so many youngsters are clamoring for freedom of some vague sort, is because of unrest and dissatisfaction with present conditions; I don't believe this machine age gives full satisfaction in a spiritual way, if the term may be allowed.

I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, & am content.

When a nation forgets her skill in war, when her religion becomes a mockery, when the whole nation becomes a nation of money-grabbers, then the wild tribes, the barbarians drive in... Who will our invaders be? From whence will they come?