Raymond Carver Quotes

Life is short, but it's long enough to ruin any man who wants to be ruined.

A wrong concept misleads the understanding; a wrong deed degrades the whole man, and may eventually demolish the structure of the human ego.

The men were all scumbags, but the whole point of the film is to show the development of that. Each guy is going in there to have a good time. By and large, these men are career men, family men, and you just see the deterioration of them.

Still, I have been no one's enemy but my own. My easy nature, either in drinking or anything else, was always ready to submit to persuasions of profligate companions, who often led me into snares.

A man of genius has been seldom ruined but by himself.

Another man whose social life has ruined him.

A drunkard in the gutter is just where he ought to be, according to the fitness and tendency of things. Nature has set upon him the process of decline and dissolution by which she removes things which have survived their usefulness.

It's been said to me that I'm self-destructive because I'll walk away from things that are good.

I was extremely greedy and lost my moral compass.

My life is littered with bad decisions.

I knew how it was with drunks. They ran out of generosity, even for themselves.

Even the most fickle are faithful to a few bad habits.

I drink too much, I smoke too much, I take pills too much, I work too much, I girl around too much, I everything too much.

Somebody said to me this morning, 'To what do you attribute your longevity?' I don't know. I mean, I couldn't have planned my life out better. By all accounts I should be dead! The abuse I put my body through: the drugs, the alcohol, the lifestyle I've lived the last 30 years!

It's a lot easier to sabotage your career than to have a career to sabotage.

I'm always playing these mendacious characters who end up hoisting themselves by their own petard.

Whether we fall by ambition, blood, or lust, like diamonds we are cut with our own dust.

The King, long in the habit of drowning his cares in wine, plunges deeper and deeper; the Queen cries out but, but sins on.

It's more sad than anything else, to see someone with such potential throw it all down the drain because of a sexual addiction.

I was born with good health and a strong body and spent years abusing them.

Self-destruction is such an interesting thing for a dramatist, and what's particular to Nixon is how human the failings were that led to his downfall.

All men that are ruined, are ruined on the side of their natural propensities.

I think now the trace of egotism may have been the beginning of all his troubles

There are few things easier than to live badly and die well.

Most men spend the best part of their lives making the remaining part wretched.