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312 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1941
“Ir por la vida con conciencia es como conducir un coche con el freno de mano puesto.”Había oído que esta novela era una de las mejores que se habían escrito sobre los sucios entresijos del mercado del cine Hollywoodiense.
“Los tres principales productos que fabrica esta ciudad son películas, ambición y miedo.”
“Trabaja mucho, y si no puedes trabajar mucho, sé listo; y si no puedes ser listo, llama la atención.”
- Henry, ¿sabes lo que he estado haciendo durante las dos últimas horas
- Sí, poniéndose como una cuba.
- No, elaborando una teoría que acabará con el odio en el mundo.
- Eso es lo mismo.
“A mí me gusta bailar con bailarines pasables. No sé por qué pero suelen ser mejores tipos.”
“Me pregunto si lo que hace que Sammy nos parezca tan fascinante es que él es el «id»… el centro de nuestros instintos básicos, que el superego viste con la ropa de la respetabilidad para mostrarlos al mundo exterior”
“…cuando él aparece modifica el aire que una respira, lo intensifica… sentía un deseo irracional de saber qué sentiría al tener dentro de mí esa imparable ambición, frenesí y violencia.”
“Creo que no tuviste elección. En tu caso se trataba de escoger entre ser un buen tipo y un fracasado o tal como eres ahora. No, supongo que ni siquiera pudiste escoger. El mundo decidió por ti.”
"I'll keep my ear to the ground for you, kid. Maybe in a couple of years I'll have a chance to slip you in as a cub reporter."
That was the first time he ever scared me. Here I was going out of my way to be nice to him and he answered me with a look that was almost contemptuous.
"Thanks, Mr. Manheim," he said, "but don't do me any favors. I know this newspaper racket. Couple of years at cub reporter? Twenty bucks. Then another stretch as district man. Thirty-five. And finally you're a great big reporter and get forty-five for the rest of your life. No, thanks."
I just stood there looking at him, staggered. Then...
"Hey, boy!" And he's off again, breaking the indoor record for the hundred-yard dash.
I thought of all the things I might have told him. You never had the first idea of give-and-take, the social intercourse. It had to be you, all the way. You had to make individualism the most frightening ism of all. You act as if the world is just a blindfold free-for-all. Only the first time you get it in the belly you holler brotherhood. But you can't have your brothers and eat them too. You're all alone, pal, all alone. That's the way you wanted it, that's the way you learned it. Sing it, Sammy, sing it deep and sad, all alone and feeling blue, all alone in crowded theaters, company conventions, all alone with twenty of Gladys's girls tying themselves into lewd knots for you. All alone in sickness and in health, for better or for worse, with power and with Harringtons till death parts you from your only friend, your worst enemy, yourself.