Quotes from Ben Hecht

Well, then I spent three days in the Field Museum, eyeing the exhibits. Can you beat it? I walk around and walk around rubbering at mummies and bones and—well, I ain't kiddin', but they was among the three most interesting days I ever put in.

Well, then I spent three days in the Field Museum, eyeing the exhibits. Can you beat it? I walk around and walk around rubbering at mummies and bones and—well, I ain't kiddin', but they was among the three most interesting days I ever put in. And I felt pretty good, too, knowin' that no copper would be thinking of Dapper Pete as being in the museums.

He half-hears the familiar accusation that the policeman drones, a terribly matter-of-fact drone. Another raid on a suspected flat. Routine, routine. Evil has its eternal root in the cities. A tireless Satan, bored with the monotony of his rôle; a tireless Justice, bored with the routine of tears and pleadings, lies and guilt. There is no story in all this.

I'll give you another chance," he says. "The next time it'll be jail. Keep this in mind. If you're brought in again, no excuses will go. Call the next case." Now one can follow Fanny. She walks out of the courtroom. The street swallows her. Nobody in the crowds knows what has happened. Fanny is anybody now. Still, one may follow. Perhaps something will reveal itself, something will add an illuminating touch to the incident of the courtroom.

Art is a contagious business. Perfectly normal and marvelously wholesome-minded people are as likely to succumb to it as anybody else. It is significant that the Purity League meeting in the city a few weeks ago discussed the dangers which lay in exposing even decent, law-abiding people to art, any kind of art.

but a lot o' molls and a lot of sucker guys. Them? Say, they never learn no better. Tough guys ain't no different from soft guys, see? They all fall for the dames just as hard and just as worse. There's many a good guy in this place that's been gave a tumble by them, see?

He was in love with life as an ant on a summer blade of grass.

I'm a Hollywood writer, so I put on my sports jacket and take off my brain.

Three years ago, the white hope of the theatre. Today, a mug. That's New York for you. Puts you on a Christmas tree, and then - the alley.

I have written a raucous valentine to a poet's dream and agony.

Chicago is a sort of journalistic Yellowstone Park, offering haven to a last herd of fantastic bravos.

What better is there to sigh for than happiness, yesterday's or tomorrow's.

Hollywood held this double lure for me, tremendous sums of money for work that required no more effort than a game of pinochle.

There's only one law you gotta follow to keep outta trouble. Do it first, do it yourself, and keep on doin' it.

Since my boyhood, I have sought always to please, but out of a kindness in me, never out of fear or respect for what was in others.

Time is a circus always packing up and moving away.

There is hardly one in three of us who live in the cities who is not sick with unused self.

A movie is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it.

In pre-movie days, the business of peddling lies about life was spotty and unorganized. It was carried on by the cheaper magazines, dime novels, the hinterland preachers and whooping politicians.

For many years Hollywood held this double lure for me, tremendous sums of money for work that required no more effort than a game of pinochle.

Movies are one of the bad habits that have corrupted our century. They have slipped into the American mind more misinformation in one evening than the Dark Ages could muster in a decade.

There is nothing as dull as an intellectual ally after a certain age.

Despite all our toil and progress, the art of medicine still falls somewhere between trout casting and spook writing.

Trying to determine what is going on in the world by reading newspapers is like trying to tell the time by watching the second hand of a clock.