Quotes by Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast

Explore a curated collection of 51 quotes by Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast. Discover timeless wisdom, insightful thoughts, and memorable words that have inspired readers around the world. Browse through the gallery below and click on any quote to read more.

Philosophy without action is the ruin of the soul. One brave deed is worth a hundred books, a thousand theories, a milli — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
But it is a writer's duty to write and speak and record the truth, always the truth, no matter whom may be offended. — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
The novel should tell the truth, as I see the truth, or as the novelist persuades me to see it. And one more demand: I e — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
If it's knowledge and wisdom you want, then seek out the company of those who do real work for an honest purpose. — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
I am hopeful, though not full of hope, and the only reason I don't believe in happy endings is because I don't believe i — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
Ah yes, the head is full of books. The hard part is to force them down through the bloodstream and out through the finge — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
As for writing, that's a cruel hard business. Unless you're very lucky it'll break your heart. — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
What is the essence of the art of writing? Part One: Have something to say. Part Two: Say it well. — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
Certainly, I want to capture the reader's attention from the beginning and hold it until the end: that is half the purpo — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
[R]eality and real people are too subtle and complicated for anybody's typewriter, even Tolstoy's, even yours, even mine — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
Why can't we simply borrow what is useful to us from Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, especially Zen, as we borrow from Chris — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
Perhaps I shouldn't call it shit. That's a bit crude. I don't really despise Christianity or even the Roman Church, and — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
In this respect the differences between the USA and the USSR are those of evangelical dinosaurs competing for domination — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
The more we learn of outer space and inner space, of quasars and quarks, of Big Bangs and Little Blips, the more remote, — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
Readers, not critics, are the people who determine a book's eventual fate. — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
I would not sacrifice a single living mesquite tree for any book ever written. One square mile of living desert is worth — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
In the land of bleating sheep and braying jackasses, one brave and honest man is bound to create a scandal. — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
And the so-called 'political process' is a fraud: Our elected officials, like our bureaucratic functionaries, like even — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
If you hope for any sort of dialogue and unity with all factions on the vaguely leftist or radical side of politics, you — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast
The weather here is windy, balmy, sometimes wet. Desert springtime, with flowers popping up all over the place, trees le — Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast