Explore Quotes by Joseph Heller

And anything worth dying for

Well then I'd certainly be a damned fool to feel any other way, wouldn't I?

Suppose everyone on our side felt that way?

I had examined myself pretty thoroughly and discovered that I was unfit for military service.

The enemy is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he's on.

I'd like to see the government get out of war altogether and leave the whole field to private individuals.

I'm gonna live forever, or die trying.

We do have a zeal for laughter in most situations, give or take a dentist.

How much reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who finds it necessary to include such phenomena as phlegm and tooth decay in His divine system of Creation? What in the world was running through that warped, evil, scatological mind of His when He robbed old people of the power to control their bowel movements?

Success and failure are both difficult to endure. Along with success come drugs, divorce, fornication, bullying, travel, meditation, medication, depression, neurosis and suicide. With failure comes failure.

I think that maybe in every company today there is always at least one person who is going crazy slowly.

All through the night, men looked at the sky and were saddened by the stars.

I’m not running away from my responsibilities. I’m running to them. There’s nothing negative about running away to save my life.

In short, Clevinger was one of those people with lots of intelligence and no brains, and everyone knew it except those who soon found it out.

I’m cold,' Snowden said softly, 'I’m cold.' 'You’re going to be all right, kid,' Yossarian reassured him with a grin. 'You’re going to be all right.' 'I’m cold,' Snowden said again in a frail, childlike voice. 'I’m cold.' 'There, there,' Yossarian said, because he did not know what else to say. 'There, there.' 'I’m cold,' Snowden whimpered. 'I’m cold.' 'There, there. There, there.

There was no telling what people might find out once they felt free to ask whatever questions they wanted to.

Her own body was such a familiar and unremarkable thing to her that she was puzzled by the convulsive ecstasy men could take from it, by the intense and amusing need they had merely to touch it, to reach out urgently and press it, squeeze it, pinch it, rub it. She did not understand Yossarian's lust; but she was willing to take is word for it.

Nately had a bad start. He came from a good family.

Where were you born?" "On a battlefield," [Yossarian] answered. "No, no. In what state were you born?" "In a state of innocence.

Something did happen to me somewhere that robbed me of confidence and courage and left me with a fear of discovery and change and a positive dread of everything unknown that may occur.

Someone had to do something sometime. Every victim was a culprit, every culprit a victim, and somebody had to stand up sometime to try to break the lousy chain of inherited habit that was imperiling them all.