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Quotes About Individuality

After a while," said Cyrus, "you'll think no thought the others do not think. You'll know no word the others can't say. And you'll do things because the others do them. You'll feel the danger in any difference whatever—a danger to the whole crowd of like-thinking, like-acting men.
~ John Steinbeck
Her self was an island.
~ John Steinbeck
Will liked to live so that no one could find fault with him, and to do that he had to live as nearly like other people as possible.
~ John Steinbeck
The door was closed to men. It was a sanctuary where women could be themselves—smelly, wanton, mystic, conceited, truthful, and interested. The whalebone corsets came off at Dessie's, the sacred corsets that molded and warped woman-flesh into goddess-flesh. At Dessie's they were women who went to the toilet and overate and scratched and farted. And from this freedom came laughter, roars of laughter.
~ John Steinbeck
Thank God this man has no message. Thank God he has no will to be remembered, to be believed in." And, in sudden heresy, "else there might be a new Christ here in the West.
~ John Steinbeck
A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.
~ John Steinbeck
I know,' said Winter, 'but they don't know.' And he went on with a thought he had been having. 'A time-minded people,' he said, 'and the time is nearly up. They think that just because they have only one leader and one head, we are all like that. They know that ten heads lopped off will destroy them, but we are a free people; we have as many heads as we have people, and in a time of need leaders pop up among us like mushrooms.
~ John Steinbeck
But now I been thinkin' what he said, an' I can remember-all of it. Says one time he went out in the wilderness to find his own soul, an' he foun' he jus' got a little piece of a great big soul. Says a wilderness ain't no good, 'cause his little piece of a soul wasn't no good 'less it was with the rest, an' was whole.
~ John Steinbeck
Once the miracle of creation has taken place, the group can build and extend it, but the group never invents anything. The preciousness lies in the lonely mind of a man.
~ John Steinbeck
And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world.
~ John Steinbeck
She stepped around in front of him and stopped him. "You look here, mister. You kiss me now." "Why?" She said slowly, "So everybody will know that I'm Mrs. Lettuce-head.
~ John Steinbeck
Some men there are who go down the dismal wrack of soldiering, surrender themselves, and become faceless. But these had not much face to start with. And maybe you're like that. But there are others who go down, submerge in the common slough, and then rise more themselves than they were, because—because they have lost a littleness of vanity and have gained all the gold of the company and the regiment.
~ John Steinbeck
Don't you dare take the lazy way. It's too easy to excuse yourself because of your ancestry...Whatever you do, it will be you who do it-not your mother.
~ John Steinbeck
Fark bir kiÅŸidedir, tek ba??na bir kiÅŸide... Yegane güç, bir tek sendedir. BaÅŸka hiçbir ÅŸeye güvenemezsin.
~ John Steinbeck
is the only creative species, and it has only one creative instrument, the individual mind and spirit of a man. Nothing was ever created by two men. There are no good collaborations, whether in music, in art, in poetry, in mathematics, in philosophy. Once the miracle of creation has taken place, the group can build and extend it, but the group never invents anything. The preciousness lies in the lonely mind of a man.
~ John Steinbeck
I don't think they's luck or bad luck. On'y one thing in this worl' I'm sure of, an' that's I'm sure nobody got a right to mess with a fella's life. He got to do it all hisself. Help him, maybe, but not tell him what to do.
~ John Steinbeck
Our species is the only creative species, and it has only one creative instrument, the individual mind and spirit of a man. Nothing was ever created by two men. There are no good collaborations, whether in music, in art, in poetry, in mathematics, in philosophy. Once the miracle of creation has taken place, the group can build and extend it, but the group never invents anything. The preciousness lies in the lonely mind of a man. And
~ John Steinbeck
There's people that when they see Samuel Hamilton the first time might get the idea he's full of bull. He don't talk like other people. He's an Irishman. And he's all full of plans—a hundred plans a day. And he's all full of hope.
~ John Steinbeck
How can we live without our lives? How will we know it's us without our past? No. Leave it. Burn it.
~ John Steinbeck
Greatness is lonely and mediocre people feel consoled by that thought. One has to choose between greatness and mediocrity oneself and the responsibility is all theirs if they accept greatness.
~ John Steinbeck
My father made a mold and forced me into it," Adam said. "I was a bad casting but I couldn't be remelted. Nobody can be remelted. And so I remained a bad casting
~ John Steinbeck
No man really knows about other human beings. The best he can do is to suppose that they are like himself. What a frightening thing is the human, a mass of gauges and dials and registers, and we can read only a few and those perhaps not accurately. A man is a lonely thing.
~ John Steinbeck
Says one time he went out in the wilderness to find his own soul, an' he foun' he didn' have no soul that was his'n. Says he foun' he jus' got a little piece of a great big soul. Says a wilderness ain't no good, 'cause his little piece of a soul wasn't no good 'less it was with the rest, an' was whole.
~ John Steinbeck
I try to write what seems to me true. If it isn't true for other people, then it isn't good art. But I've only my own eyes to see with. I won't use the eyes of other people.
~ John Steinbeck