Captain Queeg quotes

View Quote Gentlemen, we'll be shipmates for a long time and I thought we ought to get acquainted. I've formed some good impressions. you're probably curious about me. Well, my background is simple enough. Just another naval officer. I've had seven tough years in the Atlantic. Believe you me, they made the last two mighty interesting. The way those subs ganged up on us I thought they had it in for me, personally. Now to get down to cases. Any one who knows me knows I'm a book man. I believe everything was put in it for a purpose. When in doubt, remember we do things by the book. Deviate from the book, and you'd better have good reasons and you'll still get an argument from me. And I don't lose arguments on board my ship. That's one of the nice things about being captain. I want you to remember one thing. Aboard my ship, excellent performance is standard, standard performance is sub-standard, and sub-standard performance is not permitted to exist - that, I warn you.

View Quote Mr. Maryk, you may tell the crew for me that there are four ways of doing things aboard my ship: The right way, the wrong way, the Navy way, and my way. They do things my way, and we'll get along.

View Quote This is the captain speaking. Some misguided sailors on this ship still think they can pull a fast one on me. Well, they're very much mistaken. Since you've taken this course, the innocent will be punished with the guilty. There will be no liberty for any member of this crew for three months. I will not be made a fool of! Do you hear me?

View Quote I suppose you're wondering why I called this meeting. As you all know we had an excellent dessert for dinner tonight: ice cream and frozen strawberries. About an hour ago, I sent Whittaker to the pantry to bring me another portion. He came back with the ice cream, all right, but he said: "Sir, there ain't no more strawberries." Now, Gentlemen, I do not believe that the officers of this ship consumed a full gallon of strawberries. I intend to prove it.

View Quote He was no different from any other officer in the ward room, they were all disloyal. I tried to run the ship properly, by the book, but they fought me at every turn. The crew wanted to walk around with their shirt tails hanging out, that's all right, let them. Take the tow line, defective equipment, no more, no less. But they encouraged the crew to go around scoffing at me, and spreading wild rumors about steaming in circles, and then old yellow-strain. I was to blame for Lt. Maryk's incompetence and poor seamanship. Lt. Maryk was the perfect officer, but not Captain Queeg. Ah, but the strawberries, that's, that's where I had them, they laughed at me and made jokes, but I proved beyond the shadow of a doubt, with geometric logic, that a duplicate key to the ward room icebox did exist, and I've had produced that key if they hadn't pulled the Caine out of action. I, I know now they were only trying to protect some fellow officer. [He pauses - looked at all the questioning faces that stared back at him, and realizes that he has been ranting and raving] Naturally, I can only cover these things from memory. If I left anything out, why, just ask me specific questions and I'll be glad to answer them, one by one.