All I know is this: nobody's very big in the first place, and it looks to me like everybody spends their whole life tearing everybody else down.

— Ken Kesey

But he won’t let the pain blot out the humor no more’n he’ll let the humor blot out the pain.

— Ken Kesey

But if the strength ain't real, I recall thinking the very last thing that day, before I finally passed out, then the weakness sure enough is. Weakness is true and real. I used to accuse the kid of faking his weakness. But faking proves the weakness is real. Or you wouldn't be so weak as to fake it. No, you can't ever fake being weak. You can only fake being strong. . .

— Ken Kesey

But I remember one thing: it wasn't me that started acting deaf, it was people that first started acting like I was too dumb to hear or see or say anything at all.

— Ken Kesey

He couldn't seem to get his teeth into anything. Except books. The things in books was darn near more real to him than the things breathing and eating.

— Ken Kesey

He knew you can't really be strong until you can see a funny side of things.

— Ken Kesey

He knows that you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy

— Ken Kesey

He’s like an old clock they won’t tell time but won’t stop either with the hands bend out of shape and the face bare of numbers and the alarm rusted silent, an old worthless clock that keeps ticking and cuckolding without meaning nothing.

— Ken Kesey

He's the sort of guy that gets a laugh out of people.

— Ken Kesey

I can’t do anything for you either, Billy. You know that. None of us can. You got to understand that as soon as a man goes to help somebody, he leaves himself wide open. He has to be cagey, Billy, you should know that as well as anyone. What could I do? I can’t fix your stuttering. I can’t wipe the razor blade scars off your wrists or the cigarette burns off the back of your hands. Furthermore, I can’t give you a new mother. And as far as the nurse riding you like this, rubbing your nose in your weakness till what little dignity you got left is gone, and you shrink up to nothing from humiliation, I can’t do anything about that, either.

— Ken Kesey