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5e9bfaa
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The Carmel is a lovely little river. It isn't very long but in its course it has everything a river should have. It ... tumbles down a while, runs through shallows, ... crackles among round boulders, wanders lazily under sycamores, spills into pools where trout live ... In the winter, it becomes a torrent, ... and in the summer it is a place for children to wade in and for fishermen to wander in.
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river
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John Steinbeck |
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4ec743c
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But it isn't hunger that drives millions of armed American Males to forests and hills every autumn, as the high incidence of heart failure among the hunters will prove. Somehow the hunting process has to do with masculinity, but I don't quite know how.
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humor
hunting
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John Steinbeck |
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6b1c873
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We have in past been forced into reluctant change by weather, calamity, and plague. Now the pressure comes from our biologic success as a species. We have overcome all enemies but ourselves.
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John Steinbeck |
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6cfcfb8
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The hell with it! There ain't no sin and there ain't no virtue. There's just stuff people do. It's all part of nice, but that's as far as any man got a right to say.
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John Steinbeck |
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76e0a75
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Misfortune is a fact of nature acceptable to women, especially when it falls on other women.
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John Steinbeck |
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5f95f2d
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The ancient commission of the writer has not changed. He is charged with exposing our many grievous faults and failures, with dredging up to the light our dark and dangerous dreams for the purpose of improvement.
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writing
exposure
improvement
failures
faults
writers
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John Steinbeck |
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98375b7
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Financial bitterness could not eat too deeply into Mack and the boys, for they were not mercantile men. They did not measure their joy in goods sold, their egos in bank balances, nor their loves in what they cost.
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John Steinbeck |
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4781cb8
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The medical profession is unconsciously irritated by lay knowledge.
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humor
medical
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John Steinbeck |
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c59c5d6
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He wanted to say something beautiful, I think.
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John Steinbeck |
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b49d153
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Rama continued: "I do not know whether there are men born outside humanity, or whether some men are so human as to make others seem unreal. Perhaps a godling lives on earth now and then. Joseph has strength beyond vision of shattering, he has the calm of mountains, and his emotion is as wild and fierce and sharp as the lightning and just as reasonless as far as I can see or know. When you are away from him, try thinking of him and you'll se..
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John Steinbeck |
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3be1e84
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Only once or twice in her life had she ever understood all of him, but the part of him which she knew, she knew intricately and well. No little appetite or pain, no carelessness or meanness in him escaped her; no thought or dream or longing in him ever reached her. And yet several times in her life she had seen the stars.
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the-moon-is-down
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John Steinbeck |
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9a53658
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But to find where you are going, you must know where you are, and I didn't.
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John Steinbeck |
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2be05e3
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The good story lay in half-told things which must be filled in out of the hearer's own experience.
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John Steinbeck |
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da9bb90
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They had spoken once, but there is not need for speech if it is only a habit anyay. Kino sighed with satisfaction -- and that was conversation.
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John Steinbeck |
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c15a04b
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I know it might be better for you to come out from under your might-have-beens, into the winds of the world.
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John Steinbeck |
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da23343
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With all the polls and opinions posts, with newspapers more opinion than news so that we no longer know one from the other....
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John Steinbeck |
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f1a1073
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It was a good thing, we told ourselves; the eyes grow weary with looking at new things; sleeping late, we said, has its genuine therapeutic value; we would be better for it, would be able to work more effectively. We have little doubt that all this was true, but we wish we could build as good a rationalization every time we are lazy. For in some beastly way this fine laziness has got itself a bad name. It is easy to see how it might have co..
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war
contemplation
laziness
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John Steinbeck |
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5639f6b
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It is a cosmic joke. Preoccupation with survival has set the stage for extinction.
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John Steinbeck |
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9acafc7
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Porque se dice que los humanos no se satisfacen jamas, que se les da una cosa y siempre quieren algo mas. Y se dice esto con erroneo desprecio, ya que es una de las mayores virtudes que tiene la especie y que la hace superior a los animales que se dan por satisfechos con lo que tienen.
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John Steinbeck |
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a99e2dc
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Once Ed said to me, "For a very long time I didn't like myself." It was not said in self-pity but simply as an unfortunate fact. "It was a very difficult time," he said, "and very painful. I did not like myself for a number of reasons, some of them valid and some of them pure fancy. I would hate to have to go back to that. Then gradually," he said, "I discovered with surprise and pleasure that a number of people did like me. And I thought, ..
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John Steinbeck |
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1185b2d
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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.
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John Steinbeck |
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887adc2
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Show me the man who isn't interested in discussing himself.
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John Steinbeck |
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bed2d48
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Communications must destroy localness, by a slow, inevitable process.
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John Steinbeck |
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db67227
|
Oh, we can populate the dark with horrors, even we who think ourselves informed and sure, believing nothing we cannot measure or weigh. I knew beyond all doubt that the dark things crowding in on me either did not exist or were not dangerous to me, and still I was afraid. I thought how terrible the nights must have been in a time when men knew the things were there and were deadly. But no, that's wrong. If I knew they were there, I would ha..
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fear
darkness
fear-of-the-dark
not-knowing
unknown
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John Steinbeck |
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37138c6
|
Courage and fear were one thing too.
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fear
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John Steinbeck |
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c3907bf
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Some men ease themselves like setting hens into the nest of death.
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John Steinbeck |
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786e8fe
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There is no such thing as just enough money. Only two measures: No Money and Not Enough Money.
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John Steinbeck |
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38f19dc
|
And here's a story you can hardly believe, but it's true, and it's funny and it's beautiful. There was a family of twelve and they were forced off the land. They had no car. They built a trailer out of junk and loaded it with their possessions. They pulled it to the side of 66 and waited. And pretty soon a sedan picked them up. Five of them rode in the sedan and seven on the trailer, and a dog on the trailer. They got to California in two j..
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John Steinbeck |
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543354e
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Fella in business got to lie an' cheat, but he calls it somepin else. That's what's important. You go steal that tire an' you're a thief, but he tried to steal your four dollars for a busted tire. They call that sound business.
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John Steinbeck |
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d6162b8
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It is easy, out of laziness, out of weakness, to throw oneself into the lap of deity, saying, 'I couldn't help it; the way was set.' But think of the glory of the choice!
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theology
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John Steinbeck |
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ea9d5fe
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You're not buying only junk, you're buying junked lives. And more - you'll see - you're buying bitterness.
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John Steinbeck |
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dcb24f8
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But George sat stiffly on the bank and looked at his right hand that had thrown the gun away. The group burst into the clearing, and Curley was ahead. He saw Lennie lying on the sand. "Got him, by God." He went over and looked down at Lennie, and then he looked back at George. "Right in the back of the head," he said softly. Slim came directly to George and sat down beside him, sat very close to him. "Never you mind," said Slim. "A guy got..
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John Steinbeck |
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97452ec
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He lived in a strange, silent house and looked out of it through calm eyes. He was a stranger to all the world, but he was not lonely.
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John Steinbeck |
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1ab0995
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She used religion as a therapy for the ills of the world and herself, and she changed the religion to fit the ill. When she found that the theosophy she had developed for communication with a dead husband was not necessary, she cast about for some new unhappiness.
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unhappiness
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John Steinbeck |
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d8dd926
|
It is a child speaking," said Merlin, "not a king and not a knight, but a hurt and angry child, or you would know, my lord, that there is more to a king than a crown, and far more to a knight than a sword. You were a knight when you grappled Pellinore unarmed." "And he defeated me." "You were a knight," said Merlin. "Somewhere in the world there is defeat for everyone. Some are destroyed by defeat, and some made small and mean by victory. G..
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John Steinbeck |
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a49a435
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Then the hard, dry Spaniards came exploring through, greedy and realistic, and their greed was for gold or God. They collected souls as they collected jewels. They gathered mountains and valleys, rivers and whole horizons, the way a man might now gain tittle to building lots.
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conquistadors
spaniards
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John Steinbeck |
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6c9873b
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Everything seems to work with a recurring rhythm except life. There is only one birth and only one death. Nothing else is like that.
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death
life
recurring-rhythm
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John Steinbeck |
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acceab1
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Looks kinda scrummy
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John Steinbeck |
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6ab0ca5
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S-l-o-w-ness--it gave meaning to everything. It made everything royal.
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John Steinbeck |
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62b3511
|
Lanser said, "There are no peaceful people, when will you learn it? There are no friendly people, can't you understand that?"
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John Steinbeck |
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4001fbe
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And the girl,' Lanser continued, 'the girl, Lieutenant, you may rape her, or protect her, or marry her--that is of no importance so long as you shoot her when it is ordered.
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John Steinbeck |
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f3b05eb
|
You're buying years of work, toil in the sun; you're buying a sorrow that can't talk. But watch it, mister. There's a premium goes with this pile of junk and the bay horses - so beautiful - a packet of bitterness to grow in your house and to flower, some day. We could have saved you, but you cut us down, and soon you will be cut down and there'll be none of us to save you.
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John Steinbeck |
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25e4b8d
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We sat on a crate of oranges and thought what good men most biologists are, the tenors of the scientific world--temperamental, moody, lecherous, loud-laughing, and healthy. Once in a while one comes on the other kind--what used in the university to be called a 'dry-ball'--but such men are not really biologists. They are the embalmers of the field, the picklers who see only the preserved form of life without any of its principle. Out of thei..
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John Steinbeck |
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afe0829
|
Let's get it over and the door closed shut on it! Let's close it like a book and go on reading! New chapter, new life.
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John Steinbeck |