Quotes from Larry McMurtry

Po Campo had given him a hailstone dipped in molasses and he sat licking it and feeling alternately happy and sad while the men got dressed and prepared to be cowboys again.

What would you know about anything, Jasper?" Augustus asked. "Age don't slow a man's whoring. It's lack of income that does that. No more prosperous than you look, I wouldn't think you'd know much about it.

but mash whiskey took some of the dry away and made Augustus feel nicely misty inside—foggy and cool as a morning in the Tennessee hills. He seldom got downright drunk, but he did enjoy feeling misty along about sundown

He doesn't talk much, though, she added. I don't care whether he talks or not, Lorena said. I wouldn't marry a man just for conversation. I'd rather read and having to know how than listen to some man talk.

My main skills are talking and cooking biscuits," Augustus said. "And getting drunk on the porch. I've probably slipped a little on the biscuits in the last few days, and I've lost the porch, but I can still talk with the best of them.

You don't get the pint, Woodrow," Augustus said. "I've walked the earth in my pride all these years. If that's lost, then let the rest be lost with it. There's certain things my vanity won't abide.

the family got nervous about blood poisoning and persuaded he and Call to saw it off.

She sighed. Men were a pain.

all vessels leaked to some degree.

I still think we ought to just hire the town and take it with us. Then we'd have a good barkeep and someone to play the pianer.

She wasn't going to succeed in newspapers if she didn't ask the big questions when she could.

He was just a husband and a salaried man. Choice didn't play any part in his life.

Could any woman live every day with that level of masculinity?

There was no degree of competence that would assure anyone of survival, and no scale that would tell a commander which man would live and which man would die.

Looking at her, though, was like looking at the hills. The hills stayed as they were. You could go them, if you had the means, but they extended no greeting.

Because the grave's our destination," Mr. Sedgwick said. "Those who hurry usually get to it quicker than those who take their time.

He decided not to shoot the tall stranger, mainly because he admired his soft felt hat.

But the English are different, and they don't know how to be other than different.

no matter how well he worked. It was a little discouraging: the harder he tried to please the Captain, the less the Captain seemed to be pleased.

There's no one book that would define me; I'd have to name nearly every book that I've read over the past 70 years. Reading has sustained me and has been the one constant throughout my life.

For all you know it invites people to rob us. (Woodrow Call's disparaging comment on the Latin sign Gus McCrae affixed to their wagon.)

CHERFUL IN ALL WEATHERS, NEVER SHERKED A TASK, SPLENDID BEHAVIOUR.

Besides, though she considered herself his sweetheart, she didn't consider him her master.

It doesn't do to sacrifice for people unless they want you to.