James M. Cain
James M. Cain
James Mallahan Cainwas an American author and journalist. Cain vehemently opposed labeling, but he is usually associated with the hardboiled school of American crime fiction and is seen as one of the creators of the roman noir. Several of his crime novels inspired successful movies...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth1 July 1892
CountryUnited States of America
mean home museums
A home is not a museum. It doesn't have to be furnished with Picasso paintings, or Sheraton suites, or Oriental rugs, or Chinese pottery. But it does have to be furnished with things that mean something to you.
men
I had killed a man, for money and a woman. I didn't have the money and I didn't have the woman.
gun men haste
A gun is like breath to a drowning man--it has to be drawn in haste.
criticism critics
Time is the only critic.
fear hate
That's all it takes, one drop of fear to curdle love into hate.
girl distance years
Yes, I have actually mined coal, and distilled liquor, as well as seen a girl in a pink dress, and seen her take it off. I am 54 years old, weigh 220 pounds, and look like the chief dispatcher of a long-distance driving concern. I am a registered Democrat. I drink.
ifs can-do you-can-do-it
If you have to do it, you can do it.
noon
They threw me off the haytruck about noon.
men wife car
Stealing a man's wife, that's nothing, but stealing his car, that's larceny.
new-york cities village
New York is not even a city, it's a congerie of rotten villages.
hands cracks whips
The hand that holds the money cracks the whip.
writing waiting mind
You have to wait for your mind to catch up with whatever it is it’s working on; then you can write a novel.
guitar moonlight
A guitar has moonlight in it.
writing college typewriters
A lot of novelists start late-Conrad, Pirandello, even Mark Twain. When you're young, chess is all right, and music and poetry. But novel-writing is something else. It has to be learned, but it can't be taught. This bunkum and stinkum of college creative writing courses! The academics don't know that the only thing you can do for someone who wants to write is to buy him a typewriter.