Top 500 J.D. Salinger Quotes (2024 Update)
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151. “I don’t think it would have all got me quite so down if just once in a while – just once in a while – there was at least some polite little perfunctory implication that knowledge should lead to wisdom, and that if it doesn’t, it’s just a disgusting waste of time! But there never is! You never even hear any hints dropped on a campus that wisdom is supposed to be the goal of knowledge. You hardly ever even hear the word ‘wisdom’ mentioned!”

— J.D. Salinger

152. “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.”

— J.D. Salinger

153. “But it wasn’t just that he was the most intelligent member in the family. He was also the nicest, in lots of ways. He never got mad at anybody. People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did, and he had very red hair.”

— J.D. Salinger

154. “The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall off, they fall off, but it’s bad if you say anything to them.”

— J.D. Salinger

155. “I don’t want to scare you,” he said, “but I can very clearly see you dying nobly, one way or another, for some highly unworthy cause.”

— J.D. Salinger

156. “I don’t even know what I was running for – I guess I just felt like it.”

— J.D. Salinger

157. “If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the movies. Don’t even mention them to me.”

— J.D. Salinger

158. “I think that one of these days,” he said, “you’re going to have to find out where you want to go. And then you’ve got to start going there.”

— J.D. Salinger

159. “That’s the whole trouble. When you’re feeling very depressed, you can’t even think.”

— J.D. Salinger

160. “How that name comes up. Mixing memory and desire.”

— J.D. Salinger

161. “I knew it wasn’t too important, but it made me sad anyway.”

— J.D. Salinger

162. “I felt so lonesome, all of a sudden. I almost wished I was dead.”

— J.D. Salinger

163. “People never think anything is anything really. I’m getting goddam sick of it.”

— J.D. Salinger

164. “It’s really too bad that so much crumby stuff is a lot of fun sometimes.”

— J.D. Salinger

165. “Anyway I just got your beautiful letter and I love you to pieces, distraction, etc.”

— J.D. Salinger

166. “Some of my best friedns are children. In fact, all of my best friends are children.”

— J.D. Salinger

167. “People always think something’s all true. I don’t give a damn, except that I get bored when people tell me to act my age. Sometimes I act a lot older than I am, I really do. But people never notice. People never notice anything.”

— J.D. Salinger

168. “She said she knew she was able to fly because when she came down she always had dust on her fingers from touching the light bulbs.”

— J.D. Salinger

169. “I don’t exactly know what I mean by that, but I mean it.”

— J.D. Salinger

170. “And I have one of those very loud, stupid laughs. I mean if I ever sat behind myself in a movie or something, I’d probably lean over and tell myself to please shut up.”

— J.D. Salinger

171. “Nothing in the voice of the cicada intimates how soon it will die.”

— J.D. Salinger

172. “She was a girl who for a ringing phone dropped exactly nothing. She looked as if her phone had been ringing continually ever since she had reached puberty.”

— J.D. Salinger

173. “I never seem to have anything that if I lost it I’d care too much about.”

— J.D. Salinger

174. “This sentence I’m reading is terrific.” I can be quite sarcastic when I’m in the mood. He didn’t get It, though.”

— J.D. Salinger

175. “God, I wish you could have been there.”

— J.D. Salinger

176. “The more expensive a school is, the more crooks it has – I’m not kidding.”

— J.D. Salinger

177. “It’s funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they’ll do practically anything you want them to.”

— J.D. Salinger

178. “If you sat around there long enough and heard all the phonies applauding and all, you got to hate everybody in the world, I swear you did.”

— J.D. Salinger

179. “Its really hard to be roommates with people if your suitcases are much better than theirs.”

— J.D. Salinger

180. “I hate saying corny things like “traveling incognito.” But when I’m with somebody that’s corny, I always act corny too.”

— J.D. Salinger

181. “I got up and went over and looked out the window. I felt so lonesome, all of a sudden. I almost wished I was dead.”

— J.D. Salinger

182. “What I think is, you’re supposed to leave somebody alone if he’s at least being interesting and he’s getting all excited about something. I like it when somebody gets excited about something. It’s nice.”

— J.D. Salinger

183. “Life is a gift horse in my opinion.”

— J.D. Salinger

184. “Real ugly girls have it tough. I feel so sorry for them sometimes.”

— J.D. Salinger

185. “It isn’t very serious, I have this tiny little tumor on the brain.”

— J.D. Salinger

186. “I hate actors. They never act like people. They just think they do.”

— J.D. Salinger

187. “I felt so damn happy all of a sudden, the way old Phoebe kept going around and around. I was damn near bawling, I felt so damn happy, if you want to know the truth.”

— J.D. Salinger

188. “He calls me Miss Spiritual Tramp of 1948.”

— J.D. Salinger

189. “Soon the Laughing Man has amassed the largest personal fortune in the world. Most of it he contributed anonymously to the monks of a local monastery- humble ascetics who had dedicated their lives to raising German police dogs.”

— J.D. Salinger

190. “If you want to know the truth, the guy I like best in the Bible, next to Jesus, was that lunatic and all, that lived in the tombs and kept cutting himself with stones. I like him ten times as much as the Disciples, that poor bastard.”

— J.D. Salinger

191. “You take a very handsome guy, or a guy that thinks he’s a real hot-shot, and they’re always asking you to do them a big favor. Just because they’re crazy about themself, they think you’re crazy about them, too, and that you’re just dying to do them a favor. It’s sort of funny, in a way.”

— J.D. Salinger

192. “Then I started reading this timetable I had in my pocket. Just to stop lying. Once I getstarted, I can go for hours if I feel like it. No kidding. Hours.”

— J.D. Salinger

193. “It was against my principles and all, but I was feeling so depressed I didn’t even think. That’s the whole trouble. When you’re feeling very depressed, you can’t even think.”

— J.D. Salinger

194. “These intellectual guys don’t like to have an intellectual conversation with you unless they’re running the whole thing.”

— J.D. Salinger

195. “You don’t always have to get too sexy to get to know a girl.”

— J.D. Salinger

196. “I’d rather push a guy out the window or chop his head off with an ax than sock him in the jaw.”

— J.D. Salinger

197. “And yet I still act sometimes like I was only about twelve. Everybody says that, especially my father. It’s partly true, but it isn’t all true. People always think something’s all true. I don’t give a damn, except that I get bored sometime when people tell me to act my age. Sometimes I act a lot older like I am – I really do – but people never notice it. People never notice anything.”

— J.D. Salinger

198. “Anyway, I’m sort of glad they’ve got the atomic bomb invented. If there’s ever another war, I’m going to sit right the hell on top of it. I’ll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will.”

— J.D. Salinger

199. “Finally, though, I’d leave the room without even taking a sock at him. I’d probably go down to the can and sneak a cigarette and watch myself getting tough in the mirror. Anyway, that’s what I thought about the whole way back to the hotel. It’s no fun to be yellow. Maybe I’m not all yellow. I don’t know. i think maybe I’m just partly yellow and partly the type that doesn’t give much of a damn if they lose their gloves.”

— J.D. Salinger

200. “Hell is the suffering of being unable to love.”

— J.D. Salinger