Quotes from John Kennedy Toole

This failure to make contact with reality is, however, characteristic of almost all of America's "art." Any connection between American art and American nature is purely coincidental, but this is only because the nation as a whole has no contact with reality.

Then, too, if I were a Negro, I would not be pressured by my mother to find a good job, for no good jobs would be available. My mother herself, a worn old Negress, would be too broken by years of underpaid labor as a domestic to go out bowling at night. She and I could live most pleasantly in some moldy shack in the slums in a state of ambitionless peace, realizing contentedly that we were unwanted, that striving was meaningless.

Open your heart, Ignatius, and you will open your valve.

And who knows? Those people might have much better things to do than to loiter about Levy Pants, such as composing jazz or creating new dances or doing whatever those things are that they do with such facility.

When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him. Jonathan Swift— "THOUGHTS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS, MORAL AND DIVERTING

thought you'd make Levy Pants nationwide.

The power-crazed leaders of the world would certainly be surprised to find that their military leaders and troops were only masquerading sodomites who were only too eager to meet the masquerading sodomite armies of other nations in order to have dances and balls and learn some foreign dance steps.

Es que a veces me pongo tan triste –dijo la señora Reilly–. La vida no es fácil. Además he trabajado muy duro. Ya estoy harta.

Parce que, à sa façon de causer, on voyait bien que le gars était allé très longtemps à l'école. C'était probablement ce qui l'avait rendu dingue.

When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip.

Dac? apare pe lume vreun geniu adev?rat, îl vei cunoaÅŸte sigur dup? acest semn, ÅŸi anume toÅ£i imbecilii se vor uni într-o conjuraÅ£ie împotriva lui.

producing Mr. Reilly in the abundant flesh.

Yes? I shall have a coffee, Ignatius said grandly. Chicory coffee with boiled milk. Only instant, the bartender said. I can't possibly drink that, Ignatius told his mother. It's an abomination. Well, get a beer, Ignatius. It won't kill you. I may bloat.

Menos mal que mi bigote filtra parte del hedor. Aun así, mis órganos olfativos están empezando a emitir señales de inquietud.

Of course," Ignatius said in a thoughtful, serious voice, "this could be a worldwide deception." The red sateen scarf rode up and down. "The next war could turn out to be one massive orgy. Good grief. How many of the military leaders of the world may simply be deranged old sodomites acting out some fake fantasy role? Actually, this might be quite beneficial to the world. It could mean an end to war forever. This could be the key to lasting peace.

What you think about somebody wants peace, Claude?" "That sounds like a communiss to me." Mrs.

For Christmas, Mrs. Levy always compiled not a gift list but rather a list of the injustices and brutalities she had suffered since August. The girls got this list in their stockings. The only gift Mrs. Levy asked of the girls was that they attack their father. Mrs. Levy loved Christmas.

I was in the Pre-School Play section, but we never played like the name said. We had to listen to stories some old woman read to us out of a grownup book that we didn't understand.

Then read from the treasured volume The poem of thy choice. And lend to the rhyme of the poet The beauty of thy voice. And the night shall be filled with music, And the cares, that infest the day, Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, And as silently steal away.

There may be a few costumes. That's what's so wonderful about New Orleans. You can masquerade and Mardi Gras all year round if you want to. Really, sometimes the Quarter is like one big costume ball. Sometimes I can't tell friend from foe. But if you oppose costumes, I'll tell everyone, although their little hearts will snap with disappointment.

Optimism nauseates me. It is perverse. Since man's fall, his proper position in the universe has been one of misery.

The police? George heard his mother asking at the door. You must have the wrong apartment. George started for the kitchen before he realized that there was nowhere to go. The apartments in the housing project had only one door.

Ignatius spent the day in his room napping fitfully and attacking his rubber glove during his frequent, anxious moments of consciousness.

He lunged at the glove, deflowering it, stabbing it, conquering it.