“If you love something set it free, but don't be surprised if it comes back with herpes.”
Chuck Palahniuk (1962) American novelist, essayist
Funny quotes page 4
“You tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is 'never try.'
Homer Simpson”
Matt Groening (1954) American cartoonist
“Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.”
Will Rogers (1879–1935) American humorist and entertainer
“It goes without saying that you should never have more children than you have car windows”
Erma Bombeck (1927–1996) When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent le…
“Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us.”
Stephen Colbert (1964) American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor
“A two-year old is kind of like having a blender, but you don't have a top for it.”
Jerry Seinfeld (1954) American comedian and actor
“My mother loved children -- she would have given anything if I had been one.”
Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American comedian
George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States
2010s, 2015, Remarks at the SMU 100th Spring Commencement (May 2015)
Context: To those of you who are graduating this afternoon with high honors, awards, and distinctions, I say, 'well done'. And as I like to tell the 'C' students: You, too, can be President.
“A pessimist is a man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it.”
George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright
“Life is ours to be spent, not to
be saved.”
D.H. Lawrence (1885–1930) English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter
“By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.”
Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author
The Enemies of Reason, "The Irrational Health Service" [1.02], 20 August 2007, timecode 00:13:05"ff"
The Enemies of Reason (August 2007)
Variant: We should be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brain falls out.
“Here's to our wives and girlfriends… may they never meet!”
Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American comedian
citation needed
Variation on an old Royal Navy wardroom toast: "Wives and Sweethearts! May they never meet!"[citation needed]
“Political correctness is tyranny with manners.”
Charlton Heston (1923–2008) American actor
Speech at the Harvard Law School (1999), as quoted in "Appreciation : Charlton Heston" in TIME magazine (6 April 2008) http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1728272,00.html
“My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.”
Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician
“The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) British journalist, businessman, and essayist
“I have learned from my mistakes, and I am sure I can repeat them exactly”
Peter Cook (1937–1995) British architect
“Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.”
"The Early Essays".
Source: Without Feathers (1975)
“If you die in an elevator, be sure to push the up button.”
Sam Levenson (1911–1980) American journalist
“They say all marriages are made in heaven, but so are thunder and lightning.”
Clint Eastwood (1930) actor and director from the United States
“The secret of staying young is to live honestly, eat slowly, and lie about your age.”
Lucille Ball (1911–1989) American actress and businesswoman
“It's not true that I had nothing on. I had the radio on.”
Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer
As quoted in TIME magazine when "asked if she really had nothing on in the photograph [for a 1949 calendar]" ("Something for the Boys." Time 60, no. 6 (August 11, 1952): 90)
Variant: I had the radio on.
“His lack of education is more than compensated for by his keenly developed moral bankruptcy.”
Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician
“The secret is that there is no secret.”
Lionel Shriver book We Need to Talk About Kevin
Source: We Need to Talk About Kevin
“When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President. I’m beginning to believe it.”
Clarence Darrow (1857–1938) American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union
As quoted in Clarence Darrow for the Defense (1941) by Irving Stone, Ch. 6
“procrastination is the
art of keeping
up with yesterday”
Don Marquis (1878–1937) American writer
certain maxims of archy
archy and mehitabel (1927)
Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)
“Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded.”
Yogi Berra (1925–2015) American baseball player, manager, coach
The Yogi Book. New York: Workman Publishing. 1997. ISBN 0-7611-1090-9, p. 16
What Time Is It? You Mean Now?: Advice for Life from the Zennest Master of Them All, Simon and Schuster, 2003, ISBN 0743244532, p. 81.
Found in newspapers from the early twentieth century. Not attributed to Berra until 1962. See http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/08/29/too-crowded/
Disputed, Misattributed
Variant: It's so crowded, nobody goes there.
“A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down.”
Robert Benchley (1889–1945) American comedian
"Your Boy and His Dog," Liberty magazine, (30 July 1932) <br class="br">Also published in Chips Off the Old Benchley http://books.google.com/books?id=1-gHw9bqQqAC&q=%22A+dog+teaches+a+boy+fidelity+perseverance+and+to+turn+around+three+times+before+lying+down%22&pg=PA94#v=onepage (1949)
“We learn from experience that men never learn anything from experience.”
George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright
“All generalizations are false, including this one.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity
“If you try to fail, and succeed, which have you done?”
George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian
“Talking about music is like dancing about architecture.”
Steve Martin (1945) American actor, comedian, musician, author, playwright, and producer
“It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose yours.”
Harry Truman (1884–1972) American politician, 33rd president of the United States (in office from 1945 to 1953)
Quoted in The Observer 13 April 1958
“Sometimes the greatest things are the most embarrassing.”
Ellen DeGeneres (1958) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actress
Source: Seriously... I'm Kidding
Carl Sagan book Broca's Brain
Broca's Brain (1979), p. 64 http://books.google.com/books?id=90DuAAAAMAAJ <br class="br">Source: Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science <br class="br">Context: The fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.
“Lead me not into temptation; I can find the way myself.”
Rita Mae Brown (1944) Novelist, poet, screenwriter, activist
“Always remember you’re unique. Just like everyone else.”
Cheyenne McCray (1965) writer
Demons Not Included
“Don't eat fruits or nuts. You are what you eat.”
Jim Davis (1945) American cartoonist and creator of Garfield
“Eighty percent of success is showing up.”
Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician
“Life is hard. After all, it kills you.”
Katharine Hepburn (1907–2003) film, stage, and television actress
Source: Me: Stories of My Life
“It pays to keep an open mind, but not so open your brains fall out.”
Carl Sagan (1934–1996) American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author and science educator
Scott Lynch (1978) American writer
In George R. R. Martin & Gardner Dozois (eds.) Rogues (p. 245)
Short fiction, A Year and a Day in Old Theradane (2014)
“Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it’s thinking of yourself less.”
Clive Staples Lewis (1898–1963) Christian apologist, novelist, and Medievalist
Day 19: Cultivating Community
The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For? (2002)
“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.”
Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) American poet, short story writer, critic and satirist
Widely attributed to Dorothy Parker and to Ellen Parr, but the origin is unknown.
Attributed
“I think that Man in creating God somewhat overestimated his abilities.”
Johannes Grenzfurthner (1975) Austrian artist, writer, curator, and theatre and film director
aphorism used in mRIF http://monochrom.at/mrif
“The business of business is business.”
Alfred P. Sloan (1875–1966) American businessman
Widely attributed to Milton Friedman, and sometimes cited as being in his work Capitalism and Freedom (1962) this is also attributed to Alfred P. Sloan, sometimes with citation of a statement of 1964, but sometimes with attestations to his use of it as a motto as early as 1923.
Disputed
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
Oscar Levant (1906–1972) American comedian, composer, pianist and actor
As quoted in On the 8th Day — God Laughed (1995) by Gene Perret, p. 95.
“Don't worry about the world coming to an end today …… It's already tomorrow in Australia.”
Charles M. Schulz (1922–2000) American cartoonist
Came from an online quiz falsely attributed to Schulz http://www.snopes.com/glurge/schulz.asp. However, in the 13 June 1980 Peanuts strip http://www.gocomics.com/peanuts/1980/06/13, Marcie does say "I promise there'll be a tomorrow, sir. In fact, it's already tomorrow in Australia." <br class="br">Misattributed
“The future was not what it used to be.”
K. A. Bedford book Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait
Source: Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait (2008), Chapter 13 (p. 156)
“How many people here have telekinetic powers? Raise my hand.”
Emo Philips (1956) American comedian
E=MO² (1985)
Billy Sunday (1862–1935) American evangelist and baseball player
in Press, Radio, Television, Periodicals, Public Relations, and Advertising, As Seen through Institutes and Special Occasions of the Henry W. Grady School of Journalism (1967) edited by John Eldridge Drewry.
“I knew I was an unwanted baby when I saw that my bath toys were a toaster and a radio.”
Joan Rivers (1933–2014) American comedian, actress, and television host
As quoted in The 2,548 Best Things Anybody Ever Said (2003), by R. Byrne, 94
“If you think you are too small to make a difference, you have never been in bed with a mosquito”
Tenzin Gyatso (1935) spiritual leader of Tibet
The earliest known example of this quote comes from a January 1993 article in Time magazine, where it is associated with British businesswoman Anita Roddick:: "Even Body Shop trucks are employed as rolling billboards for pithy slogans. Roddick's current favorite, taken from the side of one of her company's lorries: IF YOU THINK YOU'RE TOO SMALL TO HAVE AN IMPACT, TRY GOING TO BED WITH A MOSQUITO". <br class="br">IN the 21st century, it was cited as an "African proverb". Earliest attribution to Dalai Lama is from 2004. <br class="br">Disputed <br class="br">Source: Philip Elmer-DeWitt, "Anita the Agitator" https://books.google.com/books?id=Cm7uAAAAMAAJ&dq=%22anita+roddick%22+mosquito&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=mosquito, Time, 1993-01-25 <br class="br">Source: https://indianinthemachine.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/if-you-think-youre-too-small-to-make-a-difference-try-sleeping-in-a-closed-room-with-a-mosquito-african-proverb/ <br class="br">Source: https://books.google.com/books?id=K8Q53xW1ie8C&pg=PA1&dq=%22too+small+to+make+a+difference%22+mosquito+lama&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjjxrTbkbnJAhVHLYgKHVfdB84Q6AEIIjAB#v=onepage&q=%22too%20small%20to%20make%20a%20difference%22%20mosquito%20lama&f=false
“If love is the answer, could you please rephrase the question?”
Jane Wagner (1935) Playwright, actress
Other material for Lily Tomlin
G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English mystery novelist and Christian apologist
Illustrated London News (16 July 1910)
George Will (1941) American newspaper columnist, journalist, and author
The Leveling Wind: politics, the culture, and other news, 1990-1994 (c. 1994), Will, Viking; as cited in Quotable Quotes (1997), Editors of Reader’s Digest, Penguin : ISBN 1606525956
1990s
“My girlfriend looks a little like Charlize Theron…and a lot like Patrick Ewing.”
Zach Galifianakis (1969) American actor and comedian
Live at the Purple Onion (2007)
“My fake plants died because I did not pretend to water them.”
Mitch Hedberg (1968–2005) American stand-up comedian
Mitch All Together (2003)
“Great art is the contempt of a great man for small art.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) American novelist and screenwriter
Notebook L (1945) edited by Edmund Wilson
Quoted, Notebooks
“The business of business is business.”
Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer
Widely attributed to Friedman, and sometimes cited as being in his work Capitalism and Freedom (1962) this is also attributed to Alfred P. Sloan, sometimes with citation of a statement of 1964, but sometimes with attestations to his use of it as a motto as early as 1923.
Disputed
“There, but for the grace of God, goes God.”
Herman J. Mankiewicz (1897–1953) American screenwriter
On Orson Welles, quoted in the New York Times, 11 October 1985
Tina Fey (1970) American comedian, writer, producer and actress
On Comedy
Source: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/11/03/anchor-woman
“A woman's mind is cleaner than a man's—she changes it oftener.”
Oliver Herford (1863–1935) American writer
Saturday Review of Literature, Volume 26 (1943), p. 4.
Attributed
George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian
The actual author of this quote is Roger J. Corless, from his book "The Vision of Buddhism: the Space Under the Tree". The original quote is, "We make ourselves miserable by first closing ourselves off from reality and then collecting this and that in an attempt to make ourselves happy by possessing happiness. But happiness is not something I have, it is something I myself want to be. Trying to be happy by accumulating possessions is like trying to satisfy hunger by taping sandwiches all over my body." ( [Corless, Robert J., Vision of Buddhism: The Space Under the Tree, http://books.google.com/books?hl=de&id=KecGAAAAYAAJ&q=sandwiches#search_anchor, 2013-03-07, 1998, Paragon House, 1557782008, 20, 362] )
Misattributed
“Looking fifty is great—if you're sixty.”
Joan Rivers (1933–2014) American comedian, actress, and television host
As quoted in Dick Enberg's Humorous Quotes for All Occasions (2000), p. 21
“All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening.”
Alexander Woollcott (1887–1943) American critic
"The Knock at the Stage Door" in Reader's Digest (December 1933); also in A Dictionary of Catch Phrases : British and American, from the Sixteenth Century to the Present Day (1986) http://books.google.com.br/books?id=Nm3jbg0JalMC&pg=PA24&dq=All+the+things+I+really+like+to+do+are+either+illegal,+immoral,+or+fattening by Eric Partridge and Paul Beale, ISBN 041505916X, ISBN 9780415059169 .
“A lie will gallop halfway round the world before the truth has time to pull its breeches on.”
Cordell Hull (1871–1955) American politician, U.S. Secretary of State from 1933 to 1944
Memoirs of Cordell Hull (1948), 1:220
This is a variant of similar statements attributed earlier to Mark Twain, e.g., "A lie will fly around the whole world while the truth is getting its boots on." The oldest attribution (1831) is to Fisher Ames: “falsehood proceeds from Maine to Georgia, while truth is pulling on his boots”.
Irving Caesar (1895–1996) American composer and lyricist
This is actually James Branch Cabell from The Silver Stallion (1926)
Misattributed
“A bore is a man who, when you ask how he is, tells you.”
Bert Leston Taylor (1866–1921) American writer
The So-Called Human Race (1922), Quote from: 1001 quotations to inspire you before you die; Quintessence Editions Ltd., 2016, ISBN 978-1-84403-895-4
“I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”
Thomas Edison (1847–1931) American inventor and businessman
As quoted in: [J. L.] Elkhorne. Edison — The Fabulous Drone, in 73 Vol. XLVI, No. 3 (March 1967) http://www.arimi.it/wp-content/73/03_March_1967.pdf, p. 52 <br class="br">Disputed
“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”
Thomas Edison (1847–1931) American inventor and businessman
As quoted in An Enemy Called Average (1990) by John L. Mason, p. 55.
Date unknown
“When a man opens a car door for his wife, it's either a new car or a new wife.”
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (1921) member of the British Royal Family, consort to Queen Elizabeth II
On marriage, as quoted in "48 of Prince Philip's greatest gaffes and funny moments" https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/04/48-prince-philips-greatest-gaffes-funny-moments/, The Telegraph (2 August 2017)
“It's not that I'm afraid to die, I just don't want to be there when it happens.”
" Death (A Play) http://books.google.com/books?id=qjRaAAAAMAAJ&q=%22It's+not+that+I'm+afraid+to+die+I+just+don't+want+to+be+there+when+it+happens%22&pg=PA99#v=onepage". <br class="br">Without Feathers (1975)
“Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is knowing not to use it in a fruit salad.”
O'Driscoll's widely quoted musing when asked to give his view on former Lions team mate and current England manager, Martin Johnson ahead of Ireland's Six Nations Championship match against England on 28 February 2009. Brendan Cole, " What Did BOD Mean? https://web.archive.org/web/20090228234200/http://www.rte.ie/ie/sportsixnations/entry/what_did_bod_mean", RTE Sport (February 27, 2009).
“I think those neighborhood signs that say 'slow children playing' are so very mean.”
Zach Galifianakis (1969) American actor and comedian
Live at the Purple Onion (2007)
“ROSES ARE RED. VIOLETS ARE BLUE, I'M A SCHIZOPHRENIC AND so AM I”
Larry Andersen (1953) American baseball player
He Made the saying popular on a T-Shirt he wore.
"Now Some Comic Relief" (1989)
“A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on.”
Samuel Goldwyn (1879–1974) American film producer (1879-1974).
A misreporting of an actual quote praising the trustworthiness of a colleague: "His verbal contract is worth more than the paper it's written on". The identity of the colleague is variously reported as Joseph M. Schenk in Paul F. Boller, John George, They Never Said It (1990), p. 42, or as Joseph L. Mankiewicz in Carol Easton, The Search for Sam Goldwyn (1976). Goldwyn himself was reportedly aware of - and pleased by - the misattribution.
Misattributed
“God did not intend religion to be an exercise club.”
Naguib Mahfouz (1911–2006) Egyptian writer
Attributed to Naguib Mahfouz in: Thorntize (2009) The Handbook of Wisdom and Delight. p. 121
“You cannot be anything you want to be. But you can be everything God wants you to be.”
Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer
Source: Cure for the Common Life : Living In Your Sweet Spot (2005), p. 18
“There is a thin line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.”
Oscar Levant (1906–1972) American comedian, composer, pianist and actor
As quoted in Celebrity Register: An Irreverent Compendium of American Quotable Notables (1959) by Cleveland Amory.
“The only thing that stops God sending a second Flood is that the first one was useless.”
Nicolas Chamfort (1741–1794) French writer
Characters and Anecdotes book, 1771
“I don't think anybody should write his autobiography until after he's dead.”
Samuel Goldwyn (1879–1974) American film producer (1879-1974).
Quoted in Arthur Marx, Goldwyn: The Man Behind the Myth (1976), prologue
“God is dead. Marx is dead. And I don’t feel so well myself.”
Eugéne Ionesco (1909–1994) Romanian playwright
As quoted in Jewish American Literature : A Norton Anthology (2000) by Jules Chametzky, "Jewish Humor", p. 318
“You want to talk to someone: first open your ears.”
Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French moralist and essayist
Tom Lehrer (1928) American singer-songwriter and mathematician
Introduction to "National Brotherhood Week"
That Was the Year That Was (1965)
“A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.”
George Eliot book Daniel Deronda
Daniel Deronda (1876), Bk. 2, Ch. 15
“Man has his will,—but woman has her way!”
Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809–1894) Poet, essayist, physician
The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table (1858)
Context: Though fortune scowl, though prudence interfere,
One thing is certain: Love will triumph here!
Lords of creation, whom your ladies rule,—
The world's great masters, when you 're out of school,—
Learn the brief moral of our evening's play
Man has his will,—but woman has her way!
“But as long as people will accept crap, it will be financially profitable to dispense it.”
Dick Cavett (1936) American talk show host
"Playboy Interview: Dick Cavett", Playboy, March 1971, vol. 18, no. 3, p. 70
Context: I don't think you could say now that ABC is crasser than the other two networks. But as long as people will accept crap, it will be financially profitable to dispense it. It becomes an ever-descending spiral.