How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
"The Klein boy is going to get you into trouble. He has thievish eyes. The truth now—is he a crook or not?" (4.2)
Here and elsewhere, the question of whether someone is a real criminal is posed as a question of identity. And a person's identity is visible in the eyes, apparently.
Quote #2
And I never could decide whether he meant that he was a genius or that he had one, and I suppose he wanted there should be some doubt about the meaning. He wasn't the man to come out and declare he wasn't a genius while there was a chance he might be one. (5.26)
Both Einhorn's brother and his wife—not to mention Augie—identify him as a genius in a class above the rest. Why does Augie identify Einhorn with superiority? He's not exactly king of the world. He's hardly a tycoon or business magnate. Einhorn is moderately successful, but not a lord of capitalism.
Quote #3
He wouldn't stay a cripple, Einhorn; he couldn't hold his soul in crippledom. (5.30)
Einhorn won't allow his paralysis to define him, at least not directly. For him, his paralysis is more of a setting than a characteristic—it's what inspires him to rise above.
Quote #4
You can know a man by his devils and the way he gives hurts. (6.46)
Augie meets people more malicious than Einhorn. Why does he make this observation in reference to him instead of others? He's not even the bad guy!
Quote #5
"You've got opposition in you. You don't slide through everything. You just make it look so." (7.51)
A couple people notice the opposition in Augie—he's a natural born rebel. What traits of his do you think most exemplify this opposition?
Quote #6
When I face back I can recognize myself as of this time in intimate undress, with my own and family traits of hands and feet, greenness and grayness of the eyes and up-springing hair; but at myself fully clothed and at my new social passes I have to look twice. (8.2)
Augie isn't sure what caused him to be the person he's become. He only knows that in his college years he picked up new behaviors and habits and made them his own. Arguably he does this throughout his whole life. He can't find himself because he doesn't recognize himself in his clothes and social passes.
Quote #7
But she wanted to try being a mother. (9.2)
Augie seems to sense that being a mother would, for Mrs. Renling, be more of a transitional state than a permanent identity. Hmm. Sounds like him. Augie's almost the opposite of Yoda: for him, there is only try.
Quote #8
We had to empty our pockets; they were after knives and matches and such objects of harm. But for me that wasn't what it was for, but to have the bigger existence taking charge of your small things, and making you learn forfeits as a sign that you aren't any more your own man, in the street, with the contents of your pockets your own business: that was the purpose of it. (9.166)
It's relatively common in stories about oppressive societies that the hero maintains his or her unique sense of self by keeping secret and sacred what's in the heart. Augie doesn't follow this pattern. He feels that he's not his own man if the stuff in his pockets is taken from him and examined. Maybe Augie doesn't have enough things close to his heart. That would explain why he's so darn fickle.
Quote #9
"They want to put themselves in your thoughts and in your mind, and that you should care for them. It's a sickness. But they don't want you to care for them as they really are. No. That's the whole stunt." (14.41)
Thea believes that Augie gets carried away by people because he can't properly identify their real motives and desires. Or, if he does recognize them for what they are, he's more than willing to get involved in their schemes.
Quote #10
But I hadn't served around Einhorn's poolroom or had Grandma Lausch's upbringing for nothing, and I recognized him for a crooked old bastard and prick in his heart. (15.22)
Does Augie identify others more as individual people or as archetypes? We suspect the former, as Augie's careful about using names and telling us about unique characteristics, but he's got an eye for signs of similarities.