381 Quotes by Larry McMurtry

It was often that way with women, it seemed. One minute Lorie would be drilling holes in him with her eyes, and the next minute she and Clarie would be combing one another’s hair and singing tunes.

The lives of happy people are dense with their own doings – crowded, active, thick. But the sorrowing are nomads, on a plain with few landmarks and no boundaries; sorrow’s horizons are vague and its demands are few.

He might die, but at least he could fight first, and not simply pass his days shaking at the expectation of slaughter.

It’s his dern laziness,” Call said. “Jake just kind of drifts. Any wind can blow him.

He turned the cylinder of the Colt and listened to the small, clear clicks it made. The grip was wood, the barrel cool and blue; the holster had kept a faint smell of saddle soap. He slipped the gun back in its holster, put the gun belt around his waist and felt the gun’s solid weight against his hip. When he walked out into the lots to catch his horse, he felt grown and complete for the first time in his life.

The whole point of loyalty was not to change: stick with those who stuck with you.

Many white men could not trust things unless they could be explained; and yet the most beautiful things, such as the trackless flight of birds, could never be explained.

The man turned his blue eyes on July for a moment. ‘Why, son, I’m fine,’ he said. ‘You’re the one in trouble. I can see you carry a weight on your heart. You’re hurrying along to do something you may not want to do. I see by your badge that you’re a lawman. But the crimes the law can understand are not the worst crimes. I have often sinned worse than the murderer, and yet I try to live in virtue.

Well, I got to admit I still like a fight,” Augustus said. “They sharpen the wits. The only other thing that does that is talking to women, which is usually more dangerous.