William Saroyan Quotes (137 quotes)

“I do not believe in races.”
[Seventy Thousand Assyrians (1934)]
―William Saroyan

“All things lie dark in possibility.”
[Baby (1936)]
―William Saroyan

“Genius is play, and man's capacity for achieving genius is infinite, and many may achieve genius only through play.”
[Three Times Three (1936)]
―William Saroyan

“All I can do is write my stories for mankind, and rest easy.”
[Three Times Three (1936)]
―William Saroyan

“I was a little afraid of him; not the boy himself, but of what he seemed to be: the victim of the world.”
[Little Children (1937)]
―William Saroyan

“He was just a young man who'd come to town on a donkey, bored to death or something, who'd taken advantage of the chance to be entertained by a small-town kid who was bored to death, too. That's the only way I could figure it out without accepting the general theory that he was crazy.”
[Locomotive 38, the Ojibway (1940)]
―William Saroyan

“Indians are born with an instinct for riding, rowing, hunting, fishing, and swimming. Americans are born with an instinct for fooling around with machines.”
[Locomotive 38, the Ojibway (1940)]
―William Saroyan

“The race was over. I was last, by ten yards. Without the slightest hesitation I protested and challenged the runners to another race, same distance, back. They refused to consider my proposal, which proved, I knew, that they were afraid to race me. I told them they knew very well I could beat them.”
[The Fifty Yard Dash (1940)]
―William Saroyan

“There is little pride in writers. They know they are human and shall some day die and be forgotten. Knowing all this a writer is gentle and kindly where another man is severe and unkind.”
[The Declaration of War (1944)]
―William Saroyan

“It is impossible not to notice that our world is tormented by failure, hate, guilt, and fear.”
[Letter to Robert E. Sherwood (1946)]
―William Saroyan

“I began to write in the first place because I expected everything to change, and I wanted to have things in writing the way they had been. Just a little things, of course. A little of my little.”
[One Day in the Afternoon of the World (1964)]
―William Saroyan

“One day in the afternoon of the world, glum death will come and sit in you, and when you get up to walk, you will be as glum as death, but if you're lucky, this will only make the fun better and the love greater.”
[One Day in the Afternoon of the World (1964)]
―William Saroyan

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William Saroyan

William Saroyan

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Born: August 31, 1908

Died: May 18, 1981

Occupation: Novelist, playwright

Bio: William Saroyan was an American dramatist and author. The setting of many of his stories and plays is the center of Armenian American life in California in his native Fresno.

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