The Last Picture Show Quotes

“You have to remember that I've been lonely for a long time. Loneliness is like ice. After you've been lonely long enough you don't realize you're cold, but you are... I don't know, maybe at the center of me there's some ice that never will melt, maybe it's just been there too long. But you mustn't worry. You didn't put it there.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Do you know what it means to be heartbroken?...It means your heart isn't whole, so you can't really do anything wholeheartedly.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Is growin' up always miserable?" Sonny asked. "Nobody seems to enjoy it much."
"Oh, it ain't necessarily misearble," Sam replied. "About eighty percent of the time, I guess."
They were silent again, Sam the Lion thinking of the lovely, spritely girl he had once led into the water, right there, where they were sitting.
"We ought to go to a real fishin' tank next year," Sam said finally. "It don't do to think about things like that too much. If she were here now I'd probably be crazy again in about five minutes. Ain't that ridiculous?"
A half-hour later, when they had gathered up the gear and were on the way to town, he answered his own question. "It ain't really, " he said. "Being crazy about a woman like her's always the right thing to do. Being a decrepit old bag of bones is what's ridiculous.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Why hell yes, Joe Bob! A cripple can always get himself a wooden leg, or a glass eye, or a metal hook for a hand, or any of that mess -- but there ain't no known substitute for a big dick. I guess you is out of luck!”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Do you know what it means to be heartbroken? It means your heart isn't whole, so you can't really do anything wholeheartedly.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Sometimes Sonny felt like he was the only human creature in the town. It was a bad feeling, and it usually came on him in the mornings early, when the streets were completely empty, the way they were one Saturday morning in late November.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“People he had known all his life were all around him, but they simply didn’t see him.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“He had just begun to realize how hard it was to get from day to day if one felt hopeless.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Loneliness is like ice. After you’ve been lonely long enough you don’t even realize you’re cold, but you are.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“The reason I'm so crazy is because nobody cares anything about me. I don't guess there's anybody I care much about, either. It's my own fault, though - I haven't had the guts to try and do anything about it.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“He was two or three steps away from her and for a moment they did not know how to get to one another.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Genevieve went over and kicked lightly at the front tire of her Dodge—to her the tire always looked low. The boys had made her remember what it was to be young. Once, before they had any kids, she and her husband Dan took off one weekend and drove to Raton, New Mexico. They stayed in a motel, lost twenty dollars at the horse races, made love six times in two days, and had dinner in the coffee shop of a fancy restaurant. She had even worn eye shadow. Romance might not last, but it was something while it did. She looked up the street and waved at Sam the Lion, but he was looking the other way and didn’t notice her and she went back into the empty café, wishing for a few minutes that she was young again and free and could go rattling off across Texas toward the Rio Grande.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Once you got rich you’d have to spend all your time staying rich, and that’s hard thankless work. I tried it a while and quit, myself. If I can keep ten dollars ahead of the bills I’ll be doin’ all right.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“The only really important thing I came in to tell you was that life is very monotonous. Things happen the same way over and over again. I think it’s more monotonous in this part of the country than it is in other places, but I don’t really know that—it may be monotonous everywhere. I’m sick of it, myself. Everything gets old if you do it often enough. I don’t particularly care who you marry, but if you want to find out about monotony real quick just marry Duane.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“life’s too damn hard here,” Lois said. “The land’s got too much power over you. Being rich here is a good way to go insane. Everything’s flat and empty and there’s nothing to do but spend money.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“said quietly. “It’s how much you’re worth to yourself. It’s what you really can feel that makes you nice.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“He realized Jacy had meant what she said: she was really done with him. It was very confusing to him because he had always thought you were supposed to get whoever you really loved.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Mrs. Popper smiled, but neither of them spoke again, all the way to Olney.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“I scared your daddy into getting rich. He’s so scared of me that for twenty years he’s done nothing but run around trying to find things to please me. He’s never found the right things but he made a million dollars looking.” “If Daddy could do it Duane could too,” Jacy insisted, pouting. “Not married to you, he couldn’t,” Lois said. “You’re not scary enough. You’d be miserable poor but as long as you had somebody to hold your hand and tell you how pretty you are you’d make out.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“But I don’t care about money,” Jacy said solemnly. “I don’t care about it at all.” Lois sighed. “You’re pretty stupid then,” she said. “If you’re that stupid you ought to go and marry him—it would be the cheapest way to educate you.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“When folks get rich all of a sudden it makes them feel sort of guilty to be around folks who’ve stayed poor.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Storm Warning”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Francis Goes to the Army.”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Hurry up and get changed, and don't call my daughter a bitch again.'

'No promises,' Lois said. 'You know what she's doing as well as I do, Gene. She doesn't give a damn about Sonny, she just wants to hurt us and get a little attention while she's doing it. What is that but bitchery?”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“Hurry up and get changed, and don't call my daughter a bitch again.'

'No promises,' Lois said. 'You know what she's doing as well as I do, Gene. She doesn't give a damn about Sonny, she just wants to hurt us and get a little attention while she's doing it. What is that but bitchery?”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show

“that evening: she was going to a country club dance with Lester Marlow. “She wasn’t sheddin’ no tears over the telephone,” Duane said bitterly. “She may be getting to like country club dances, that’s what worries me.” He was in such a terrible mood that the pool game wasn’t much fun. Jerry Framingham, a friend of theirs who drove a cattle truck, was shooting with them; he had to truck a load of yearlings to Fort Worth that night and asked them to ride along with him, since neither of them had dates. “We might as well,” Duane said. “Be better than loafin’ around here.” Sonny was agreeable. While Jerry went out in the country to pick up his load he and Duane walked over to the café to have supper. Sam the Lion was there, waiting for”
― Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show