Zane Grey > Quotes

“I need this wild life, this freedom.”
― Zane Grey

“Recipe For Greatness - To bear up under loss; To fight the bitterness of defeat and the weakness of grief; To be victor over anger; To smile when tears are close; To resist disease and evil men and base instincts; To hate hate and to love love; To go on when it would seen good to die; To look up with unquenchable faith in something ever more about to be. That is what any man can do, and be great.”
― Zane Grey

“At the end of the day faith is a funny thing. It turns up when you don't really expect it. Its like one day you realize that the fairy tale may be slightly different than you dreamed. The castle, well, it may not be a castle. And its not so important happy ever after, just that its happy right now. See once in a while, once in a blue moon, people will surprise you , and once in a while people may even take your breath away.”
― Grey

“Instinct may not be greater than reason, but it's a million years older. Don't fight your instincts so hard. If they were not good the God of Creation would not have given them to you.”
― Zane Grey, The Man of the Forest

“Where I was raised a woman's word was law. I ain't quite outgrowed that yet.”
― Zane Grey, Riders of the Purple Sage

“Jealousy is an unjust and stifling thing.”
― Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon

“But what can women do in times of war? They help, they cheer, they inspire, and if their cause is lost they must accept death or worse. Few women have the courage for self-destruction. "To the victor belong the spoils," and women have ever been the spoils of war.”
― Zane Grey, Maude and Miriam: Or, the Fair Crusader

“So that's troublin' you? I reckon it needn't. You see it was this way. I come round the house an' seen that fat party an' heard him talkin' loud. Then he seen me, an' very impolite goes straight for his gun. He oughtn't have tried to throw a gun on me - whatever his reason was. For that's meetin' me on my own grounds. I've seen runnin' molasses that was quicker'n him. Now I didn't know who he was, visitor or friend or relation of yours, though I seen he was a Mormon all over, an' I couldn't get serious about shootin'. So I winged him - put a bullet through his arm as he was pullin' at his gun. An' he droppped the gun there, an' a little blood. I told him he'd introduced himself sufficient, an' to please move out of my vicinity. An' went" - Lassiter”
― Zane Grey, Riders of the Purple Sage

“I knew you"d never be American enough to help me reconstruct my life.”
― Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon

“The narrator finds that as a maturing character grows in stature before her friends that she sees less stature while evaluating herself.”
― Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon

“Pride would never be her ally.”
― Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon

“He stalked into the room, leaned his long rifle against the mantelpiece and spread out his hands to the fire. He was clad from head to foot in fringed and beaded buckskin, which showed evidence of a long and arduous tramp. It was torn and wet and covered with mud. He was a magnificently made man, six feet in height, and stood straight as an arrow. His wide shoulders, and his muscular, though not heavy, limbs denoted wonderful strength and activity. His long hair, black as a raven's wing, hung far down his shoulders. Presently he turned and the light shone on a remarkable face. So calm and cold and stern it was that it seemed chiselled out of marble. The most striking features were its unusual pallor, and the eyes, which were coal black, and piercing as the dagger's point.”
― Zane Grey, Maude and Miriam: Or, the Fair Crusader

“You and I will never live to see the day that women recover their balance.”
― Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon

“The awfulness of sudden death and the glory of heaven stunned me! The thing that had been mystery at twilight, lay clear, pure, open in the rosy hue of dawn. Out of the gates of the morning poured a light which glorified the palaces and pyramids, purged and purified the afternoon's inscrutable clefts, swept away the shadows of the mesas, and bathed that broad, deep world of mighty mountains, stately spars of rock, sculptured cathedrals and alabaster terraces in an artist's dream of color. A pearl from heaven had burst, flinging its heart of fire into this chasm. A stream of opal flowed out of the sun, to touch each peak, mesa, dome, parapet, temple and tower, cliff and cleft into the new-born life of another day.

I sat there for a long time and knew that every second the scene changed, yet I could not tell how. I knew I sat high over a hole of broken, splintered, barren mountains; I knew I could see a hundred miles of the length of it, and eighteen miles of the width of it, and a mile of the depth of it, and the shafts and rays of rose light on a million glancing, many-hued surfaces at once; but that knowledge was no help to me. I repeated a lot of meaningless superlatives to myself, and I found words inadequate and superfluous. The spectacle was too elusive and too great. It was life and death, heaven and hell.”
― Zane Grey, The Last of the Plainsmen

“When I envied a man's spurs then they were indeed worth coveting.”
― Zane Grey

“I need this wild life, this freedom. To be alive, to look into nature, and so into my soul.”
― Pearl Zane Grey

“Unhappiness is only a change. Happiness itself is only change. So what does it matter? The great thing is to see life--to understand--to feel--to work--to fight--to endure.”
― Zane Grey, To The Last Man (Annotated): A Western Collection

“He saw his enemies stealthily darting from rock to tree, and tree to bush, creeping through the brush, and slipping closer and closer every moment. On three sides were his hated foes and on the remaining side—the abyss. Without a moment's hesitation the intrepid Major spurred his horse at the precipice. Never shall I forget that thrilling moment. The three hundred savages were silent as they realized the Major's intention. Those in the fort watched with staring eyes. A few bounds and the noble steed reared high on his hind legs. Outlined by the clear blue sky the magnificent animal stood for one brief instant, his black mane flying in the wind, his head thrown up and his front hoofs pawing the air like Marcus Curtius' mailed steed of old, and then down with a crash, a cloud of dust, and the crackling of pine limbs.”
― Zane Grey, Maude and Miriam: Or, the Fair Crusader

“I am waiting to plunge down, to shatter and crash, roar and boom, to bury your trail, and close forever the outlet to Deception Pass!”
― Zane Grey, Riders of the Purple Sage

“Love of man for woman - love of woman for man. That's the nature, the meaning, the best of life itself.”
― Zane Grey, Riders of the Purple Sage

“Instantly a thick blackness seemed to enfold her and silence as of a dead world settled down upon her. Drowsy as she was she could not close her eyes nor refrain from listening. Darkness and silence were tangible things. She felt them. And they seemed suddenly potent with magic charm to still the tumult of her, to sooth and rest, to create thought she had never thought before. Rest was more than selfish indulgence. Loneliness was necessary to gain conciseness of the soul.”
― Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon

“Her forefathers had been Vikings, savage chieftains who bore no cross and brooked no hindrance to their will.”
― Zane Grey, Riders of the Purple Sage: Filibooks Classics

“Like an arrow sprung from a bow Betty flashed past the Colonel and out on the green. Scarcely ten of the long hundred yards had been covered by her flying feet when a roar of angry shouts and yells warned Betty that the keen-eyed savages saw the bag of powder and now knew they had been deceived by a girl.”
― Zane Grey, Maude and Miriam: Or, the Fair Crusader

“He came at length to realize that the desert was a teacher. He did not realize all that he had learned, but he was a different man. And when he decided upon that, he was not thinking of the slow, sure call to the primal instincts of man; he was thinking that the desert, as much as he had experienced and no more, would absolutely overturn the whole scale of a man’s values, break old habits, form new ones, remake him. More of desert experience, Gale believed, would be too much for intellect. The desert did not breed civilized man, and that made Gale ponder over a strange thought: after all, was the civilized man inferior to the savage?”
― Zane Grey, Desert Gold

“...dare we live for one another? Dare we be happy?"

"Child, it's our only hope. Let us make our love atone for the hate of our fathers. We have been doomed by their sins. Not that...nor anythin' can keep us apart. I am a slayer of men, but I think God spoke to me today.”
― Zane Grey, Tonto Basin

“I arise full of eagerness and energy, knowing well what achievement lies ahead of me.”
― Zane Grey

“You dream… or you’re driven mad.”
― Zane Grey, Riders of the Purple Sage

“Mister Hawe, you come along, not satisfied with ropin”
― Zane Grey, Light of the Western Stars

“A man can die. He is glorious when he calmly accepts death; but when he fights like a tiger, when he stands at bay his back to the wall, a broken weapon in his hand, bloody, defiant, game to the end, then he is sublime. Then he wrings respect from the souls of even his bitterest foes. Then he is avenged even in his death.”
― Zane Grey, Maude and Miriam: Or, the Fair Crusader

“No nerve, hey? Not half a man!... Buster Jack, why don't you finish game? Make up for your low-down tricks. At the last try to be worthy of your dad. In his day he was a real man.... Let him have the consolation that you faced Hell-Bent Wade an' died in your boots!”
― Zane Grey, The Mysterious Rider