Category - Karl Marlantes

Discover the thoughtful Quotes of Karl Marlantes, a philosopher and author. Our collection of his most impactful quotes reflects his deep understanding of language, philosophy, and history. Motivational Quotes of Karl Marlantes
Whether seeking thought-provoking reflections or academic wisdom, Karl Marlantess words offer a rich source of intellectual inspiration. #KarlMarlantes Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

I was given the ability to create stories and characters. That’s my part of the long chain of writers, publishers, agents, booksellers, librarians, and a host of others who eventually deliver literature to the world. I want to do for others what Eudora Welty did for me.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

I began writing ‘Matterhorn’ in 1975 and for more than 30 years I kept working on my novel in my spare time, unable to get an agent or publisher to even read the manuscript.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

When I first got back from the war, I said, ‘I’m gonna write the Great American Novel about the Vietnam War.’ So I sat down and wrote 1,700 pages of sheer psychotherapy drivel. It was first person, and there would be pages about wet socks and cold feet.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

The Odyssey’ is the great tale, and I was really taken by ‘The Iliad,’ so I dig into those things, and when I was a kid I didn’t. You’ve gotta have a certain level of understanding yourself before that stuff really starts to resonate.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

Really important books to me are the classics. I try very hard to read them well – you know, especially once I got serious about writing. So, reading Tolstoy several times – ‘War and Peace,’ ‘The Kreutzer Sonata’ – all those were really important to me.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

For every veteran who goes through a divorce, a wife goes through one, too. For every veteran alone in the basement, there is a wife upstairs, bewildered, isolated and in despair from the dark clouds of war that hangs over family life.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

We all want to be special, to stand out; there’s nothing wrong with this. The irony is that every human being is special to start with, because we’re unique to start with. But we then go through some sort of boot camp from the age of zero to about 18 where we learn everything we can about how not to be unique.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

I grew up in Oregon, where as a teenager I worked with my grandfather Axel on his i shing boat at the mouth of the Columbia River.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

I mean… if you’re raised as a decent human being, killing somebody is against every moral thing you’ve ever been taught. And so, generally, in combat it’s ‘krauts,’ the ‘gooks,’ the ‘yanks’ – whatever you want to do to try and make it so that it’s not a human being.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

I mean, if you’re proud of what you’ve done when you’ve served in the military, well then we call that bragging. And if you are unhappy about what happened, we call that complaining. And so what are you going to do?

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

In the military I could exercise the power of being automatically respected because of the medals on my chest, not because I had done anything right at the moment to earn that respect. This is pretty nice. It’s also a psychological trap that can stop one’s growth and allow one to get away with just plain bad behavior.

– Karl Marlantes

Karl Marlantes

The Marine Corps taught me how to kill, but it didn’t teach me how to deal with killing.

– Karl Marlantes

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