Dos Passos Quotes

We work to eat to get the strength to work to eat to get the strength to work.

The humblest citizen in all the land, when clad in the armour of a righteous cause, is stronger than all the hosts of error." -John Dos Passos

If there is a special Hell for writers it would be in the forced contemplation of their own works, with all the misconceptions, the omissions, the failures that any finished work of art implies.

I never see the dawn that I don't say to myself perhaps.

... life is to be used, not just held in the hand like a box of bonbons that nobody eats.

I want you to stop being subhuman and become 'yourself'. 'Yourself,' I say. Not the newspaper you read, not your vicious neighbor's opinion, but 'yourself.' I know, and you don't, what you really are deep down. Deep down, you are what a deer, your God, your poet, or your philosopher is. But you think you're a member of the VFW, your bowling club, or the Ku Klux Klan, and because you think so, you behave as you do. This too was told you long ago, by Heinrich Mann in Germany, by Upton Sinclair and John Dos Passos in the United States. But you recognized neither Mann nor Sinclair. You recognize only the heavyweight champion and Al Capone. If given your choice between a library and a fight, you'll undoubtedly go to the fight.

A novel is a commodity that fulfills a certain need; people need to buy daydreams like they need to buy ice cream or aspirin or gin. They even need to buy a pinch of intellectual catnip now and then to liven up their thoughts...

Today`s culture is unfortunately inseparable from economic and military power. A ruling nation can impose its culture and give a worldwide fame to a second-rate writer like (Ernest Hemingway). (John Steinbeck) is important due to American guns. Had (John Dos Passos) and (William Faulkner) been born in Paraguay or in Turkey, who`d read them?

self respect. self reliance. self control.

The terrible thing about having New York go stale on you is that there's nowhere else. It's the top of the world.

The rich were getting richer, the poor were getting poorer, small farmers were being squeezed out, workingmen were working twelve hours a day for a bare living; profits were for the rich, the law was for the rich, the cops were for the rich;

One phrase stuck in Fainy’s mind, and he repeated it to himself after he had gone to bed that night: It is time for all honest men to band together to resist the ravages of greedy privilege.

While there is a lower class I am of it, while there is a criminal class I am of it, while there is a soul in prison I am not free.

But you’re out of another world old kid … You ought to live on top of the Woolworth Building in an apartment made of cutglass and cherry blossoms.

With people who are young and aren't scared you can do lots.

Men are under as strong a compulsion to invent an ethical setting for their behavior as spiders are to weave themselves webs.

How do I get to Broadway?...I want to get to the center of things.

If there is a special Hades for writers is would be in the forced contemplation of their own works.

So many Americans felt that their neighbor had no right to know more than they did.

The young man walks by himself, fast but not fast enough, far but not far enough (faces slide out of sight, talk trails into tattered scraps, footsteps tap fainter in alleys); he must catch the last subway, the streetcar, the bus, run up the gangplanks of all the steamboats, register at all the hotels, work in the cities, answer the wantads, learn the trades, take up the jobs, live in all the boardinghouses, sleep in all the beds. One bed is not enough, one job is not enough, one life is not enough. At night, head swimming with wants, he walks by himself alone.

all right we are two nations

If there are no permanent standards, there is no criticism possible.

The terrible thing about having New York go stale on you is that there's nowhere else. It's the top of the world. All we can do is go round and round in a squirrel cage.

Bud edged up next to a young man in a butcher’s apron who had a baseball cap on backwards.

between Don Quixote the mystic and Sancho Panza the sensualist there is no middle ground.

There’s a rattle of chains and a clatter from the donkeyengine where a tall man in blue overalls stands at a lever in the middle of a cloud of steam that wraps round your face like a wet towel.

But the workingpeople, the common people, they won't allow it.' 'It's the common people who get most fun out of the torture and execution of great men.... If it's not going too far back I'd like to know who it was demanded the execution of our friend Jesus H. Christ.

Why, lies are like a sticky juice overspreading the world, a living, growing flypaper to catch and gum the wings of every human soul. . . And the little helpless buzzings of honest, liberal, kindly people, aren't they like the thin little noise flies make when they're caught?

They have clubbed us off the streets they are stronger they are rich they hire and fire the politicians the newspapereditors the old judges the small men with reputations the collegepresidents the wardheelers (listen businessmen collegepresidents judges America will not forget her betrayers) they hire the men with guns the uniforms the policecars the patrolwagons all right you have won you will kill the brave men our friends tonight (author's punctuation)

I read and keep silent. I am one of the silent watchers. I know that every sentence, every word, every picayune punctuation that appears in the public press is perused and revised and deleted in the interests of advertisers and bondholders. The fountain of national life is poisoned at the source.

Evelyn Waugh was an illustrator. Poe was a deft portraitist. Hermann Hesse was a skilled painter, as was Strindberg. Emily and Charlotte Brontë drew, as did Goethe, Dostoevsky, George Sand, Victor Hugo, Ruskin, Dos Passos, Blake, Pushkin…

I'm going to drink till when I cut myself whiskey runs out. What's the good of blood when you can have whiskey?

But none of em seem to realize that these things aren’t always a man’s own fault. It’s luck that’s all it is,

The terrible thing about having New York go stale on you is that there’s nowhere else. It’s the top of the world. All we can do is go round and round in a squirrel cage.

Why the hell does everybody want to succeed? I'd like to meet somebody who wanted to fail. That's the only sublime thing.

There are lives to be lived if only you didn't care. Care for what, for what; the opinion of mankind, money, success, hotel lobbies, health, umbrellas, Uneeda biscuits . . .?

you dont like the stars in Old Glory Then go back to your land across the sea To the land from which you came Whatever be its name

The pressure exerted by a gas on the walls of its container does not depend upon the individual histories of the molecules composing it,” says the French existentialist philosopher.

I’m beginning to learn a few of the things I dont want,” said Herf quietly. “At least I’m beginning to have the nerve to admit to myself how much I dislike all the things I dont want.

But you just watch, little girl. I'm goin' to show 'em. In five years they'll come crawlin' to me on their bellies. I don't know what it is, but I got a kind of feel for the big money.

In a moment when criticism shows a singular dearth of direction every man has to be a law unto himself in matters of theatre, writing, and painting. While the American Mercury and the new Ford continue to spread a thin varnish of Ritz over the whole United States there is a certain virtue in being unfashionable.

Intellectually, she recognized the summer could’ve lasted only so many days, but, in remembrance, it seemed to last epochs, from the creation of the Milky Way to its expiration. Not because the time was dull but rather it was so damn fun and so life-affirming, it could’ve been a magical potion concocted to revive the dead. Even in her advanced age, she could see that time, so clearly delineated in what the novelist John Dos Passos called the Camera Eye—mental snapshots, frozen in bliss, which neither age nor time could mar their perfection.

What's the use of a lague of nations if it's to be dominated by Great Britain and her colonies?" said Mr. Rasmussen sourly. "But don't you think any kind of a league's better than nothing?" said Eveline. "It's not the name you give things, it's who's getting theirs underneath that counts," said Robbins. "That's a very cynical remark," said the California woman. "This isn't any time to be cynical." "This is a time," said Robbins, "when if we weren't cynical we'd shoot ourselves.

Never mind dear. . . . It would have been too rich anyway. . . . You eat that and I’ll let you run out after dinner and buy some candy.” “Oh goody.” “But dont eat the icecream too fast or you’ll have collywobbles.

Aint no good place to look for a job, young feller. . . . There’s jobs all right. . . . I’ll be sixty-five years old in a month and four days an I’ve worked sence I was five I reckon, an I aint found a good job yet.

Emile, you’re a goodlooking fellow and steady and you’ll get on in the world. . . . But I’ll never put myself in a man’s power again. . . . I’ve suffered too much. . . . Not if you came to me with five thousand dollars.

there can be no reason to believe these officers of an established news organization serving newspapers all over the country failed to realize their responsibilities at a moment of supreme significance to the people of this country.

Do you know how long God took to destroy the Tower of Babel, folks? Seven minutes. Do you know how long the Lord God took to destroy Babylon and Nineveh? Seven minutes. There’s more wickedness in one block in New York City than there was in a square mile in Nineveh, and how long do you think the Lord God of Sabboath will take to destroy New York City and Brooklyn and the Bronx? Seven seconds. Seven Seconds.

eu estou bem, dizia-lhe, estou bem. e ele queria saber se estar bem era andar de trombas. eu respondi que o tempo não era linear. preparem-se sofredores do mundo, o tempo não é linear. o tempo vicia-se em ciclos que obedecem a lógicas distintas e que se vão sucedendo uns aos outros repondo o sofredor, e qualquer outro indivíduo, novamente num certo ponto de partida. é fácil de entender. quando queremos que o tempo nos faça fugir de alguma coisa, de um acontecimento, inicialmente contamos os dias, às vezes até as horas, e depois chegam as semanas triunfais e os largos meses e depois os didáticos anos. mas para chegarmos aí temos de sentir o tempo também de outro modo. perdemos alguém, e temos de superar o primeiro inverno a sós, e a primeira primavera e depois o primeiro verão, e o primeiro outono. e dentro disso, é preciso que superemos os nossos aniversário, tudo quanto dá direito a parabéns a você, as datas da relação, o natal, a mudança dos anos, até a época dos morangos, o magusto, as chuvas de molha-tolos, o primeiro passo de um neto, o regresso de um satélite à terra, a queda de mais um avião, as notícias sobre o brasil, enfim, tudo. e também é preciso superar a primeira saída de carro a sós. o primeiro telefonema que não pode ser feito para aquela pessoa. a primeira viagem que fazemos sem a sua companhia. os lençóis que mudamos pela primeira vez. as janelas que abrimos. a sopa que preparamos para comermos sem mais ninguém. o telejornal que já não comentamos. um livro que se lê em absoluto silêncio. o tempo guarda cápsulas indestrutíveis porque, por mais dias que se sucedam, sempre chegamos a um ponto onde voltamos atrás, a um início qualquer, para fazer pela primeira vez alguma coisa que nos vai dilacerar impiedosamente porque nessa cápsula se injeta também a nitidez do quanto amávamos quem perdemos, a nitidez do seu rosto, que por vezes se perde mas ressurge sempre nessas alturas, até o timbre da sua voz, chamando o nosso nome, ou mais cruel ainda, dizendo que nos ama com um riso incrível pelo qual nos havíamos justificado em mil ocasiões no mundo.

And don't forget this, if a man's a success in New York, he's a success!

But what was it?” “There was a woman upstairs who did illegal operations, abortions. . . . That was what stopped up the plumbing.

That’s very nice of you George. Isn’t it amazing the way girls are getting to look more like Mrs. Castle every day? Just look round this room.

Spain as a modern centralized nation is an illusion, a very unfortunate one; for the present atrophy, the desolating resultlessness of a century of revolution, may very well be due in large measure to the artificial imposition of centralized government on a land essentially centrifugal.

but on account of the flag and prosperity and making the world safe for democracy, they were afraid to be with him, or to think much about him for fear they might believe him; for he said: While there is a lower class I am of it, while there is a criminal class I am of it, while there is a soul in prison I am not free.

There was Babylon and Nineveh; they were built of brick. Athens was gold marble columns. Rome was held up on broad arches of rubble. In Constantinople the minarets flame like great candles round the Golden Horn… Steel, glass, tile, concrete will be the materials of the skyscraper. Crammed on the narrow island the millionwindowed buildings will just glittering, pyramid on pyramid like the white cloudhead above a thunderstorm.

The twentieth century will be American. American thought will dominate it. American progress will give it color and direction. American deeds will make it illustrious. Civilization will never lose its hold on Shanghai. Civilization will never depart from Hongkong. The gates of Peking will never again be closed to the methods of modern man. The regeneration of the world, physical as well as moral, has begun, and revolutions never move backwards.

There’s a long long trail awinding . . . Over there! Over there! In the subway their eyes pop as they spell out APOCALYPSE, typhus, cholera, shrapnel, insurrection, death in fire, death in water, death in hunger, death in mud.

No, you are saying to yourselves what a bore he is, what use is he to society? He has no money, he has no pretty wife, no good conversation, no tips on the stockmarket. He's a useless fardel on society.... The artist is a fardel.

...and the Sunday the bishop came you couldn't see Halley's Comet any more and you saw the others being confirmed and it lasted for hours because there were a lot of little girls being confirmed too and all you could hear was mumble mumble this thy child mumble mumble this thy child and you wondered if you'd be alive next time Halley's Comet came round

We are caught up Mr. Perry on a great wave whether we will or no, a great wave of expansion and progress. A great deal is going to happen in the next few years. All these mechanical inventions—telephones, electricity, steel bridges, horseless vehicles—they are all leading somewhere. It’s up to us to be on the inside, in the fore-front of progress. . . .

Afterwards they walked east along Fourteenth. “Dutch cant we go to your room?” “I ain’t got no room. The old stiff wont let me stay and she’s got all my stuff. Honest if I dont get a job this week I’m goin to a recruiting sergeant an re-enlist.

Take a plunge, take a plunge . . . they’re all crooks and gamblers anyway . . . take a plunge and come up with your hands full, pockets full, bankaccount full, vaults full of money. If I only dared take the risk. Fool to waste your time fuming about it.

Chrisfield looked straight ahead of him. He did not feel lonely any more now that he was marching in ranks again. His feet beat the ground in time with the other feet. He would not have to think whether to go to the right or to the left. He would do as the others did.

U. S. A. is the slice of a continent. U. S. A. is a group of holding companies, some aggregations of trade unions, a set of laws bound in calf, a radio network, a chain of moving picture theatres, a column of stockquotations rubbed out and written in by a Western Union boy on a blackboard, a public-library full of old newspapers and dogeared historybooks with protests scrawled on the margins in pencil. U. S. A. is the world’s greatest rivervalley fringed with mountains and hills, U. S. A. is a set of bigmouthed officials with too many bankaccounts. U. S. A. is a lot of men buried in their uniforms in Arlington Cemetery. U. S. A. is the letters at the end of an address when you

But what can you do with success when you get it? You cant eat it or drink it. Of course I understand that people who havent enough money to feed their faces and all that should scurry round and get it. But success . . .” “The trouble with me is I cant decide what I want most, so my motion is circular, helpless and confoundedly discouraging.” “Oh but God decided that for you. You know all the time, but you wont admit it to yourself.” “I imagine what I want most is to get out of this town, preferably first setting off a bomb under the Times Building.

Do you know I think it is just terrible,” said Mrs. Merivale when she had done carving, “the way you fellows wont tell us any of your experiences over there. . . . Lots of them must have been remarkably interesting. Jimmy I should think you’d write a book about your experiences.

You’ll make twentyfive percent on your money by tomorrow noon. . . . Then if you want to hold you can on a gamble, but if you sell three quarters and hold the rest two or three days on a chance you’re safe as . . . as the Rock of Gibraltar.” “I know Viler, it certainly sounds good. . . . ” “Hell man you dont want to be in this damned office all your life, do you? Think of your little girl.” “I am, that’s the trouble.

It seems to me,” he said very softly, “that human society has been always that, and perhaps will be always that: organizations growing and stifling individuals, and individuals revolting hopelessly against them, and at last forming new societies to crush the old societies and becoming slaves again in their turn….” “I thought you were a socialist,” broke in Genevieve sharply, in a voice that hurt him to the quick, he did not know why.

Too goddam many lawyers mixed up in this. Run the sonsobitches out. If they resists shoot ’em, that’s what I says to the Governor, but they’re all these sonsobitches a lawyers fussin’ everythin’ up all the time with warrants and habeas corpus and longwinded rigmarole. My ass to habeas corpus.

The fact of the matter is that an honest man wont soil his hands with politics, and he’s given no inducement to take public office.” “That’s true, a live man, nowadays, wants more money, needs more money than he can make honestly in public life. . . . Naturally the best men turn to other channels.

I wonder if any of you have ever noticed that it is sometimes those who find most pleasure and amusement in their fellow man, and have most hope in his goodness, who get the reputation of being his most carping critics. Maybe it is that the satirist is so full of the possibilities of humankind in general, that he tends to draw a dark and garish picture when he tries to depict people as they are at any particular moment. The satirist is usually a pretty unpopular fellow. The only time he attains even fleeting popularity is when his works can be used by some political faction as a stick to beat out the brains of their opponents. Satirical writing is by definition unpopular writing. Its aim is to prod people into thinking. Thinking hurts. (John Dos Passos, 1957, from the speech he delivered upon accepting the Gold Medal for Eminence in Fiction from the National Institute of Arts and Letters)

Then all at once he´d hear his own voice enunciating clearly and firmly, feel its reverberance along the walls and ceiling, feel ears growing tense, men and women leaning forward in their chairs, see the rows of faces quite clearly, the groups of people who couldn´t find seats crowding at the doors. Phrases like `protest, massaction, united working-class of this country and the world, revolution´, would light up the eyes and faces under him like the glare of a bonfire.

What I need is a whiskey and soda to settle those cocktails.” “I’ll watch you. I’m a working man. I must be able to tell between the news that’s fit and the news that’s not fit. . . . God I dont want to start talking about that. It’s all so criminally silly. . . . I’ll say that this cocktail sure does knock you for a loop.

Weißt du, Jimmy, ich glaube, es wird ganz lustig sein, ein Weilchen in einer Redaktion zu sitzen." "Ich fände es schon sehr lustig, wenn ich _irgendwo_ sitzen dürfte... Na ja, da bleibe ich eben zu Haus und passe auf das Baby auf." "Sei nicht so verbittert, Jimmy, es ist ja nur vorübergehend." "Das ganze Leben ist nur vorübergehend." (S. 250)

What good? I’ll bury them back there in the court and wait. I’ll need them in the end. D’you know what it’ll mean, your revolution? Another system! When there’s a system there are always men to be bought with diamonds. That’s what the world’s like.” “But they won’t be worth anything. It’ll only be work that is worth anything.” “We’ll see,” said the Chink.

Hello. I want to speak to Mr. Jack Cunningham please. . . . Hello. Is this Mr. Cunningham’s office? Mr. James Merivale speaking. . . . Out of town. . . . And when will he be back? . . . Hum.” He strode back along the hall. “The damn scoundrel’s out of town.” “All the years I’ve known him,” said the little lady in the round hat, “that has always been where he was.

He was one of the grand old men until the churches and the congregations got wind that he was an infidel and believed in Darwin. Luther Burbank had never a thought of evil, selecting improved hybrids for America those sunny years in Santa Rosa. But he brushed down a wasp’s nest that time; he wouldn’t give up Darwin and Natural Selection and they stung him and he died puzzled.

Oh it’s all in the day’s work,” said Jimmy. “What gives me gooseflesh is the armies mobilizing, Belgrade bombarded, Belgium invaded . . . all that stuff. I just cant imagine it. . . . They’ve killed Jaures.” “Who’s he?” “A French Socialist.” “Those goddam French are so goddam degenerate all they can do is fight duels and sleep with each other’s wives. I bet the Germans are in Paris in two weeks.

Mas era primavera. Até o leão lambeu a testa glabra da leoa. (…) ‘Mas isso é amor, é amor de novo’, revoltou-se a mulher tentando encontrar-se com o próprio ódio mas era primavera e os dois leões se tinham amado. (…) Mas era primavera, e, apertando o punho no bolso do casaco, ela mataria aqueles macacos em levitação pela jaula, macacos felizes como ervas, macacos se entrepulando suaves, a macaca com olhar resignado de amor, e a outra macaca dando de mamar. (…) Ela mataria a nudez dos macacos. Um macaco também a olhou, o peito pelado exposto sem orgulho. Mas não era no peito que ela mataria, era entre aqueles olhos. De repente a mulher desviou o rosto, trancando entre os dentes um sentimento que ela não viera buscar, apressou os passos, ainda voltou a cabeça espantada para o macaco de braços abertos: ele continuava a olhar para a frente. ‘Oh não, não isso’, pensou. E enquanto fugia, disse: ‘Deus, me ensine somente a odiar’. ‘Eu te odeio’, disse ela para um homem cujo crime único era o de não amá-la. ‘Eu te odeio’, disse muito apressada. (…) ‘Eu te amo’, disse ela então com ódio para o homem cujo grande crime impunível era o de não querê-la. ‘Eu te odeio’, disse, implorando amor.

Such afternoons the buses are crowded into line like elephants in a circusparade. Morningside Heights to Washington Square, Penn Station to Grant's Tomb. Parlorsnakes and flappers joggle hugging downtown uptown, hug joggling gray square after gray square, until they see the new moon giggling over Weehawken and feel the gusty wind of a dead Sunday blowing dust in their faces, dust of a typsy twilight.

Luther Burbank was born in a brick farmhouse in Lancaster Mass, he walked through the woods one winter crunching through the shinycrusted snow stumbling into a little dell where a warm spring was and found the grass green and weeds sprouting and skunk cabbage pushing up a potent thumb, He went home and sat by the stove and read Darwin Struggle for Existence Origin of Species Natural Selection that wasn't what they taught in church, so Luther Burbank ceased to believe moved to Lunenburg, found a seedball in a potato plant sowed the seed and cashed in on Darwin’s Natural Selection on Spencer and Huxley with the Burbank potato. Young man go west; Luther Burbank went to Santa Rosa full of his dream of green grass in winter ever- blooming flowers ever- bearing berries; Luther Burbank could cash in on Natural Selection Luther Burbank carried his apocalyptic dream of green grass in winter and seedless berries and stoneless plums and thornless roses brambles cactus— winters were bleak in that bleak brick farmhouse in bleak Massachusetts— out to sunny Santa Rosa; and he was a sunny old man where roses bloomed all year everblooming everbearing hybrids. America was hybrid America could cash in on Natural Selection. He was an infidel he believed in Darwin and Natural Selection and the influence of the mighty dead and a good firm shipper’s fruit suitable for canning. He was one of the grand old men until the churches and the congregations got wind that he was an infidel and believed in Darwin. Luther Burbank had never a thought of evil, selected improved hybrids for America those sunny years in Santa Rosa. But he brushed down a wasp’s nest that time; he wouldn’t give up Darwin and Natural Selection and they stung him and he died puzzled. They buried him under a cedartree. His favorite photograph was of a little tot standing beside a bed of hybrid everblooming double Shasta daisies with never a thought of evil And Mount Shasta in the background, used to be a volcano but they don’t have volcanos any more.

Big snake appears on Fifth Avenue. . . . Ladies screamed and ran in all directions this morning at eleven thirty when a big snake crawled out of a crack in the masonry of the retaining wall of the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and Fortysecond Street and started to cross the sidewalk. . . . ” “Some fish story. . . . ” “That aint nothin,” said an old man. “When I was a boy we used to go snipeshootin on Brooklyn Flats.

He pushed up the window and leaned out. An L train was rumbling past the end of the street. A whiff of coal smoke stung his nostrils. He hung out of the window a long while looking up and down the street. The world’s second metropolis. In the brick houses and the dingy lamplight and the voices of a group of boys kidding and quarreling on the steps of a house opposite, in the regular firm tread of a policeman, he felt a marching like soldiers, like a sidewheeler going up the Hudson under the Palisades, like an election parade, through long streets towards something tall white full of colonnades and stately. Metropolis.

Amo-te tanto que te não sei amar, amo tanto o teu corpo e o que em ti não é o teu corpo que não compreendo porque nos perdemos se a cada passo te encontro, se sempre ao beijar-te beijei mais do que a carne de que és feita, se o nosso casamento definhou de mocidade como outros de velhice, se depois de ti a minha solidão incha do teu cheiro, do entusiasmo dos teus projectos e do redondo das tuas nádegas, se sufoco da ternura de que não consigo falar, aqui neste momento, amor, me despeço e te chamo sabendo que não virás e desejando que venhas do mesmo modo que, como diz Molero, um cego espera os olhos que encomendou pelo correio.

But how can they make people fight if they dont want to?” “In Europe people are slaves for thousands of years. Not like ‘ere. . . . But I’ve seen war. Very funny. I tended bar in Port Arthur, nutten but a kid den. It was very funny.” “Gee I wish I could get a job as warcorrespondent.” “I might go as a Red Cross nurse.” “Correspondent very good ting. . . . Always drunk in American bar very far from battlefield.” They laughed.

When you talk you talk with the little lying tips of your tongues. You dont dare lay bare your real souls. . . . But now you must listen to me for the last time. . . . For the last time I say. . . . Come here waiter you too, lean over and look into the black pit of the soul of man. And Herf is bored. You are all bored, bored flies buzzing on the windowpane. You think the windowpane is the room. You dont know what there is deep black inside.

Earthquake insurance, gosh they need it dont they? Do you know how long God took to destroy the tower of Babel, folks? Seven minutes. Do you know how long the Lord God took to destroy Babylon and Nineveh? Seven minutes. There’s more wickedness in one block in New York City than there was in a square mile in Nineveh, and how long do you think the Lord God of Sabboath will take to destroy New York City an Brooklyn an the Bronx? Seven seconds. Seven seconds. . . . Saykiddo what’s your name?

Say how much does a woman cost in New York?” “I dunno, expensive I guess. . . . I’m not going ashore to raise hell; I’m going to get a good job and work. Cant you think of nothing but women?” “What’s the use? Why not?” said Congo and settled himself flat on the deck again, burying his dark sootsmudged face in his crossed arms. “I want to get somewhere in the world, that’s what I mean. Europe’s rotten and stinking. In America a fellow can get ahead. Birth dont matter, education dont matter. It’s all getting ahead.

That’s just what you could do,” the woman said in a cracked voice. “That wretched coal man left it this morning and said he’d be back to bring it in. I suppose he’s drunk like the rest of them. I wonder if I can trust you in the house.” “I’m from upstate ma’am,” stammered Bud. “From where?” “From Cooperstown.” “Hum. . . . I’m from Buffalo. This is certainly the city for everyone being from somewhere else. . . . Well you’re probably a burglar’s accomplice, but I cant help it I’ve got to have that coal in. . . . Come in

A ferry was leaving the immigrant station, a murmur rustled through the crowd that packed the edges of the wharf. “Deportees. . . . It’s the communists the Department of Justice is having deported . . . deportees . . . Reds. . . . It’s the Reds they are deporting.” The ferry was out of the slip. In the stern a group of men stood still tiny like tin soldiers. “They are sending the Reds back to Russia.” A handkerchief waved on the ferry, a red handkerchief. People tiptoed gently to the edge of the walk, tiptoeing, quiet like in a sickroom.

Say mister you couldnt tell a feller where a good place was to look for a job?” “Aint no good place to look for a job, young feller. . . . There’s jobs all right. . . . I’ll be sixty-five years old in a month and four days an I’ve worked sence I was five I reckon, an I aint found a good job yet.” “Anything that’s a job’ll do me.” “Got a union card?” “I aint got nothin.” “Cant git no job in the buildin trades without a union card,” said the old man. He rubbed the gray bristles of his chin with the back of his hand and leaned over the lamps again.

Are we going to put over this bonus proposition or aint we? . . . We fought for em didnt we, we cleaned up the squareheads, didnt we? And now when we come home we get the dirty end of the stick. No jobs. . . . Our girls have gone and married other fellers. . . . Treat us like a bunch o dirty bums and loafers when we ask for our just and legal and lawful compensation. . . . the bonus. Are we goin to stand for it? . . . No. Are we go into stand for a bunch of politicians treatin us like we was goin round to the back door to ask for a handout? . . . I ask you fellers.

Aloof, as if looking through thick glass into an aquarium, she watched faces, fruit in storewindows, cans of vegetables, jars of olives, redhotpokerplants in a florist's, newspapers, electric signs drifting by. When they passed cross-streets a puff of air came in her face off the river. Sudden jetbright glances of eyes under straw hats, attitudes of chins, thick lips, pouting lips, Cupid's bows, hungry shadow under cheekbones, faces of girls and young men nuzzled fluttering against her like moths as she walked with her stride even to his through the tingling yellow night.

Compreendera então, julgo, a natureza da minha situação. A solidão de um é amenizada pela solidão de outro, e deste modo, mesmo na miséria, existe uma espécie de partilha, de comunhão, a que não se pode dar o nome de alegria mas algo como um encolher de ombros. O estudante franzino fora durante os meus primeiros meses de isolamento esse encolher de ombros, a minha resignação perante a brutalidade daquilo que me acontecera. Que ele tivesse alguém e eu não perturbava-me, colocava um entrave à nossa amizade, um ponto final no nosso monólogo. De uma certa maneira que não sei explicar senão com palavras incoerentes, até então tinha sido como se eu tivesse dado um passo ao lado que me tivesse feito sair do mundo, um pequeno passo discreto e silencioso de retirada. Após essa noite, o mundo notou a minha falta e deu também ele um passo ao lado, mas um passo do mundo é muito maior do que um passo dos nossos, e num certo sentido eu fiquei atrás das coisas, deslocado.

Eu espero alguém que não desista de mim mesmo quando já não tem interesse. Espero alguém que não me torture com promessas de envelhecer comigo, mas sim que realmente envelheça comigo. Espero alguém que se orgulhe do que escrevo, que me faça ser mais amigo dos meus amigos e mais irmão do meu irmão. Espero alguém que não tenha medo do escândalo, mas tenha medo da indiferença. Espero alguém que ponha bilhetinhos dentro daqueles livros que vou ler até o fim. Espero alguém que se arrependa rápido de suas grosserias e me perdoe sem querer. Espero alguém que me avise que estou repetindo a roupa na semana. Espero alguém que nunca abandone a conversa quando não sei mais o que falar. Espero alguém que, nos jantares entre os amigos, dispute comigo para contar primeiro como nos conhecemos. Espero alguém que goste de dirigir para nos revezarmos em longas viagens. Espero alguém disposto a conferir se a porta está fechada e o fogão desligado, se meu rosto está aborrecido ou esperançoso. Espero alguém que prove que amar não é contrato, que o amor não termina com nossos erros. Espero alguém que não se irrite com a minha ansiedade. Espero alguém que possa criar toda uma linguagem cifrada para que ninguém nos recrimine. Espero alguém que arrume ingressos de teatro de repente, que me sequestre ao cinema, que cheire meu corpo suado depois de uma corrida como se ainda fosse perfume. Espero alguém que não largue as mãos dadas nem para coçar o rosto. Espero alguém que me olhe demoradamente quando estou distraído, que me telefone para narrar como foi seu dia. Espero alguém que procure um espaço acolchoado em meu peito. Espero alguém que minta que cozinha e só diga a verdade depois que comi. Espero alguém que leia uma notícia, veja que haverá um show de minha banda predileta, e corra para me adiantar por e-mail. Espero alguém que ame meus filhos como se estivesse reencontrando minha infância e adolescência fora de mim. Espero alguém que fique me chamando para dormir, que fique me chamando para despertar, que não precise me chamar para amar. Espero alguém com uma vocação pela metade, uma frustração antiga, um desejo de ser algo que não se cumpriu, uma melancolia discreta, para nunca ser prepotente. Espero alguém que tenha uma risada tão bonita que terei sempre vontade de ser engraçado. Espero alguém que comente sua dor com respeito e ouça minha dor com interesse. Espero alguém que prepare minha festa de aniversário em segredo e crie conspiração dos amigos para me ajudar. Espero alguém que pinte o muro onde passo, que não se perturbe com o que as pessoas pensam a nosso respeito. Espero alguém que vire cínico no desespero e doce na tristeza. Espero alguém que curta o domingo em casa, acordar tarde e andar de chinelos, e que me pergunte o tempo antes de olhar para as janelas. Espero alguém que me ensine a me amar porque a separação apenas vem me ensinando a me destruir. Espero alguém que tenha pressa de mim, eternidade de mim, que chegue logo, que apareça hoje, que largue o casaco no sofá e não seja educada a ponto de estendê-lo no cabide. Espero encontrar uma mulher que me torne novamente necessário.

How grave a disappointment it must be to our great President, who has exerted himself so to bring the German people to reason, to make them understand the horror that they alone have brought deliberately upon the world! Alas! Far from it. Indeed, they have attempted with insidious propaganda to undermine the morale of our troops….” A little storm of muttered epithets went through the room. The Reverend Dr. Skinner elevated his chubby pink palms and smiled benignantly…"to undermine the morale of our troops; so that the most stringent regulations have had to be made by the commanding general to prevent it. Indeed, my friends, I very much fear that we stopped too soon in our victorious advance; that Germany should have been utterly crushed. But all we can do is watch and wait, and abide by the decision of those great men who in a short time will be gathered together at the Conference at Paris….

Say Joe what’s the dope about this war business?” “I guess they are in for it this time. . . . I’ve known it was coming ever since the Agadir incident.” “Jez I like to see somebody wallop the pants off England after the way they wont give home rule to Ireland.” “We’d have to help em. . . . Any way I dont see how this can last long. The men who control international finance wont allow it. After all it’s the banker who holds the purse strings.” “We wouldn’t come to the help of England, no sir, not after the way they acted in Ireland and in the Revolution and in the Civil War. . . . ” “Joey you’re getting all choked up with that history you’re reading up in the public library every night. . . . You follow the stock quotations and keep on your toes and dont let em fool you with all this newspaper talk about strikes and upheavals and socialism. . . . I’d like to see you make good Joey. . . . Well I guess I’d better be going.

Couldn’t you let us see the baby, miss?” The nurse nodded. She was a lanternjawed grayfaced woman with tight lips. “I hate her,” whispered Susie. “She gives me the fidgets that woman does; she’s nothing but a mean old maid.” “Never mind dear, it’s just for a day or two.” Susie closed her eyes. “Do you still want to call her Ellen?” The nurse brought back a basket and set it on the bed beside Susie. “Oh isn’t she wonderful!” said Ed. “Look she’s breathing. . . . And they’ve oiled her.” He helped his wife to raise herself on her elbow; the yellow coil of her hair unrolled, fell over his hand and arm. “How can you tell them apart nurse?” “Sometimes we cant,” said the nurse, stretching her mouth in a smile. Susie was looking querulously into the minute purple face. “You’re sure this is mine.” “Of course.” “But it hasnt any label on it.” “I’ll label it right away.” “But mine was dark.” Susie lay back on the pillow, gasping for breath. “She has lovely little light fuzz just the color of your hair.” Susie stretched her arms out above her head and shrieked: “It’s not mine. It’s not mine. Take it away. . . . That woman’s stolen my baby.

Ellen got off the bus at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Fiftythird Street. Rosy twilight was gushing out of the brilliant west, glittered in brass and nickel, on buttons, in people's eyes. All the windows on the east side of the avenue were aflame. As she stood with set teeth on the curb waiting to cross, a frail tendril of fragrance brushed her face. A skinny lad with towhair stringy under a foreignlooking cap was offering her arbutus in a basket. She bought a bunch and pressed her nose in it. May woods melted like sugar against her palate. The whistle blew, gears ground as cars started to pour out of the side streets, the crossing thronged with people. Ellen felt the lad brush against her as he crossed at her side. She shrank away. Through the smell of the arbutus she caught for a second the unwashed smell of his body, the smell of immigrants, of Ellis Island, of crowded tenements. Under all the nickelplated, goldplated streets enameled with May, uneasily she could feel the huddling smell, spreading in dark slow crouching masses like corruption oozing from broken sewers, like a mob. She walked briskly down the cross-street. She went in a door beside a small immaculately polished brass plate.

... Eu me desnudo emocionalmente quando confesso minha carência – que estarei perdido sem você, que não sou necessariamente a pessoa independente que tentei aparentar. Na verdade, não passo de um fraco, cuja noção dos rumos ou do significado da vida é muito restrita. Quando choro e lhe conto coisas que, confio, serão mantidas em segredo, coisas que me levarão à destruição, caso terceiros tomem conhecimento delas, quando vou a festas e não me entrego ao jogo da sedução porque reconheço que só você me interessa, estou me privando de uma ilusão há muito acalentada de invulnerabilidade. Me torno indefeso e confiante como a pessoa no truque circense, presa a uma prancha sobre a qual um atirador de facas exercita sua perícia e as lâminas que eu mesmo forneci passam a poucos centímetros da minha pele. Eu permito que você assista a minha humilhação, insegurança e tropeços. Exponho minha falta de amor-próprio, me tornando, dessa forma, incapaz de convencer você (seria realmente necessário?) a mudar de atitude. Sou fraco quando exibo meu rosto apavorado na madrugada, ansioso ante a existência, esquecido das filosofias otimistas e entusiasmadas que recitei durante o jantar. Aprendi a aceitar o enorme risco de que, embora eu não seja uma pessoa atraente e confiante, embora você tenha a seu dispor um catálogo vasto de meus medos e fobias, você pode, mesmo assim, me amar...