Quotes about beauty
page 41

Tamsin Greig photo

“Greig, currently hot in the TV comedy Green Wing, has a dark, brittle glamour that isn't quite beauty (there's a disconcerting touch of Edwina Currie about her) and suggests an incipient unhappiness lurking beneath the ready wit.”

Tamsin Greig (1966) English actress

About her performance as Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing, by Charlie Spencer in The Telegraph. After reading the part about Edwina Currie, she refused to read any more of the article.
Criticism, A review of her as Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing

Philip Roth photo
Alauddin Khalji photo

“They took captive a great number of handsome and elegant maidens, amounting to 20,000, and children of both sexes, 'more than the pen can enumerate'… In short, the Muhammadan army brought the country to utter ruin, and destroyed the lives of the inhabitants, and plundered the cities, and captured their offspring, so that many temples were deserted and the idols were broken and trodden under foot, the largest of which was one called Somnat, fixed upon stone, polished like a mirror of charming shape and admirable workmanship' Its head was adorned with a crown set with gold and rubies and pearls and other precious stones' and a necklace of large shining pearls, like the belt of Orion, depended from the shoulder towards the side of the body….
'The Muhammadan soldiers plundered all these jewels and rapidly set themselves to demolish the idol. The surviving infidels were deeply affected with grief, and they engaged 'to pay a thousand pieces of gold' as ransom for the idol, but they were indignantly rejected, and the idol was destroyed, and 'its limbs, which were anointed with ambergris and perfumed, were cut off. The fragments were conveyed to Delhi, and the entrance of the Jami' Masjid was paved with them, that people might remember and talk of this brilliant victory.' Praise be to God, the Lord of the worlds. Amen! After some time, among the ruins of the temples, a most beautiful jasper-coloured stone was discovered, on which one of the merchants had designed some beautiful figures of fighting men and other ornamental figures of globes, lamps, etc., and on the margin of it were sculptured verses from the Kurdn. This stone was sent as an offering to the shrine of the pole of saints… At that time they were building a lofty octagonal dome to the tomb. The stone was placed at the right of the entrance. "At this time, that is, in the year 707 h. (1307 a. d.), 'Alau-d din is the acknowledged Sultan of this country. On all its borders there are infidels, whom it is his duty to attack in the prosecution of a holy war, and return laden with countless booty."”

Alauddin Khalji (1266–1316) Ruler of the Khalji dynasty

Somnath. Abdu’llah ibn Fazlu’llah of Shiraz (Wassaf) : Tarikh-i-Wassaf (Tazjiyatu’l Amsar Wa Tajriyatu’l Ãsar), in Elliot and Dowson, Vol. III : Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. pp. 43-44. Also quoted in Jain, Meenakshi (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts.
Quotes from The History of India as told by its own Historians

Victor Villaseñor photo
Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo
Frances Farmer photo
Vitruvius photo

“But basilicas of the greatest dignity and beauty may also be constructed in the style of that one which I erected, and the building of which I superintended at Fano.”

Source: De architectura (The Ten Books On Architecture) (~ 15BC), Book V, Chapter I, Sec. 6

Brigham Young photo

“Now take a person in this congregation who has knowledge with regard to being saved in the kingdom of our God and our Father and being exalted, one who knows and understands the principles of eternal life, and sees the beauty and excellency of the eternities before him compared with the vain and foolish things of the world, and suppose that he is taken in a gross fault, that he has committed a sin he knows will deprive him of the exaltation he desires, and that he cannot attain to it without the shedding of his blood, and also knows that by having his blood shed he will atone for that sin, and be saved and exalted with the Gods, is there a man or woman in this house but would say, 'shed my blood that I might be saved and exalted with the Gods?' All mankind love themselves, and let these principles be known by an individual and he would be glad to have his blood shed. That would be loving themselves, even unto an eternal exaltation. Will you love your brothers or sisters likewise, when they have committed a sin that cannot be atoned for without the shedding of their blood? Will you love that man or woman well enough to shed their blood?… I have known a great many men who have left this Church for whom there is no chance whatever for exaltation, but if their blood had been spilled, it would have been better for them. The wickedness and ignorance of the nations forbid this principle's being in full force, but the time will come when the law of God will be in full force.”

Brigham Young (1801–1877) Latter Day Saint movement leader

Journal of Discourses, 4:219 (February. 8, 1857)
Brigham Young describes the doctrine of Blood Atonement
1850s

Yurii Andrukhovych photo

“You know that we are now allowing free expression of satirical thoughts. As they say, democracy is a beautiful thing, but humanity couldn't come up with anything worse than that.”

The Moscoviad
Source: The Moscoviad. Yuri Andrukhovych. Spuyten Duyvil, New York City. ISBN1933132523, p. 130

Penn Jillette photo

“That's the beauty of the Web: You can roll around in a stranger's obsession without having to smell his or her house. You can amscray whenever you want without being rude. The site gets its "hit" and you know more about our species' diversity.”

Penn Jillette (1955) American magician

"Free Celebrity Nudes!" in Penn's Columns (15 October 1997) http://pennandteller.com/sincity/penn-n-teller/excite/celnude.html at Penn & Teller.com
1990s

Martin Gardner photo

“A surprising proportion of mathematicians are accomplished musicians. Is it because music and mathematics share patterns that are beautiful?”

Martin Gardner (1914–2010) recreational mathematician and philosopher

The Dover Math and Science Newsletter http://www.doverpublications.com/mathsci/0516/d/ May 16, 2011

Jozef Israëls photo

“No, the Dutchman is not cold, not insensitive, our people are still full of enthusiasm for what is noble and good. Holland above all! We artists, from Rembrandt to Maris, rave over our country. We find our Holland a delicious beautiful country with its meadows, its beaches, its sea, its domestic interiors, its figures, peasants, farmers, Jews, merchants, everything is similar picturesque as it is all just up for grabs. The most beautifully in the Netherlands is however Amsterdam, that delicious spacious Amsterdam, which is expressing so much and uniting so much in itself.”

Jozef Israëls (1824–1911) Dutch painter

translation from the original Dutch: Fons Heijnsbroek
version in original Dutch (citaat van Jozef Israëls, in Nederlands): Neen, de Nederlander is niet koud, niet ongevoelig, ons volk is nog steeds vol geestdrift voor wat edel en goed is. Holland bovenal! Wij kunstenaars, van Rembrandt tot Maris, dwepen met ons land. Wij vinden ons Holland een heerlijk mooi land met zijn weiden, zijn stranden, zijn zee, zijn binnenhuizen, zijn figuren, boeren, landlieden, joden, kooplieden, alles is even schilderachtig, als maar voor het grijpen. Het mooiste van Nederland is echter Amsterdam, het heerlijk ruim Amsterdam, waarvan zoveel uitgaat en dat zooveel in zich vereenigt.
Quote from Israëls' speech of thanks at the honoring-party for his 70th birthday in Arti et Amacitiae in Amsterdam, Feb 1885; as cited in 'Jozef Israëls in Arti', in Algemeen Hadelsblad, 6 Feb. 1895
Quotes of Jozef Israels, 1871 - 1900

Paula Modersohn-Becker photo
Imelda Marcos photo

“Filipinos don't wallow in what is miserable and ugly. They recycle the bad into things of beauty.”

Imelda Marcos (1929) Former First Lady of the Philippines

As quoted in "Homage to Imelda's shoes" at BBC News (16 February 2001)).

Andy Goldsworthy photo
Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo
Prince William, Duke of Cambridge photo
Buckminster Fuller photo

“The question of integrity will get finer and finer and more delicate and more beautiful.”

Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor and futurist

From 1980s onwards, Only Integrity is Going to Count (1983)

“Gratitude enhances your ability to see beauty. It's like seeing beauty in HD.”

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 98

Jane Roberts photo
Billy Graham (wrestler) photo

“I float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. There's nobody as beautiful or as powerful as me!”

Billy Graham (wrestler) (1943–2023) American professional wrestler, american football player, bodybuilder

Billy Graham, Tangled Ropes: Superstar Billy Graham (2006)

Matthew Arnold photo

“Poetry is simply the most beautiful, impressive and wisely effective mode of saying things, and hence its importance.”

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools

Heinrich Heine, p. 144
Essays in Criticism (1865)

Russell Crowe photo
Robert Seymour Bridges photo

“For beauty being the best of all we know
Sums up the unsearchable and secret aims
Of nature.”

Robert Seymour Bridges (1844–1930) British writer

The Growth of Love, Sonnet 8.
Poetry

Donald Ervin Knuth photo
Fred Dibnah photo

“Anybody who destroys anything made of stone should be prosecuted. It is not all beautiful, but it took a man all day to make one stone.”

Fred Dibnah (1938–2004) English steeplejack and television personality, with a keen interest in mechanical engineering

Unsourced

“The real sin against life is to abuse and destroy beauty, even one's own — even more, one's own, for that has been put in our care and we are responsible for its well-being.”

Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980) American journalist, essayist, short story writer, novelist, and political activist

"Herr Freytag" in Ship of Fools (1962) Pt. 3

George Holmes Howison photo
Nathaniel Hawthorne photo
Ferdinand Hodler photo
Francesco Dall'Ongaro photo

“Slowly doth bud, and slowly doth mature
The woodland oak, yet doth long time endure.
Lashed by the winds, her leaves around she steews,
But, the wind passed, her beauty she renews.”

Francesco Dall'Ongaro (1808–1873) Italian poet, playwright and librettist

Stornelli Politici, ""Costanza"".
Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 354.

Clive Staples Lewis photo
Martin Amis photo
Edward Hopper photo

“The killing of the horses [a bullfight in Madrid, he visited in June 1910] by the bull is very horrible, much more so as they have no chance to escape and are ridden up to the bull to be butchered.... the entry of the bull into the ring however is very beautiful; his surprise and the first charges he makes are very pretty.”

Edward Hopper (1882–1967) prominent American realist painter and printmaker

Quote of Hopper's letter to his sister, June 9, 1910; as cited in Edward Hopper, Gail Levin, Bonfini Press, Switzerland 1984, p. 23
1905 - 1910

Samuel Butler photo
Marlene Dietrich photo

“The legs aren't so beautiful, I just know what to do with them.”

Marlene Dietrich (1901–1992) German-American actress and singer

Source: Speaking with publicist Peter Rogers, circa 1969, as quoted in The Blackglama Story (1979) by Rogers, reproduced in "At Last! The story behind the legends... and the war of the minks; Marlene Dietrich" https://www.mediafire.com/view/shxgxgwhaj6fk9h by Ricki Fulman, New York Daily News (December 9, 1979), p. 179

Jean Toomer photo

“Superstition saw
Something it had never seen before:
Brown eyes that loved without a trace of fear,
Beauty so sudden for that time of year.”

Jean Toomer (1894–1967) American poet and novelist

from "November Cotton Flower"
Poems from Cane (1923)

Piet Mondrian photo
Percy Bysshe Shelley photo
Paula Modersohn-Becker photo
Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet photo
Brian Greene photo
Adam Smith photo

“In the languor of disease and the weariness of old age, the pleasures of the vain and empty distinctions of greatness disappear. To one, in this situation, they are no longer capable of recommending those toilsome pursuits in which they had formerly engaged him. In his heart he curses ambition, and vainly regrets the ease and the indolence of youth, pleasures which are fled for ever, and which he has foolishly sacrificed for what, when he has got it, can afford him no real satisfaction. In this miserable aspect does greatness appear to every man when reduced either by spleen or disease to observe with attention his own situation, and to consider what it is that is really wanting to his happiness. Power and riches appear then to be, what they are, enormous and operose machines contrived to produce a few trifling conveniencies to the body, consisting of springs the most nice and delicate, which must be kept in order with the most anxious attention, and which, in spite of all our care, are ready every moment to burst into pieces, and to crush in their ruins their unfortunate possessor. …
But though this splenetic philosophy, which in time of sickness or low spirits is familiar to every man, thus entirely depreciates those great objects of human desire, when in better health and in better humour, we never fail to regard them under a more agreeable aspect. Our imagination, which in pain and sorrow seems to be confined and cooped up within our own persons, in times of ease and prosperity expands itself to every thing around us. We are then charmed with the beauty of that accommodation which reigns in the palaces and economy of the great; and admire how every thing is adapted to promote their ease, to prevent their wants, to gratify their wishes, and to amuse and entertain their most frivolous desires. If we consider the real satisfaction which all these things are capable of affording, by itself and separated from the beauty of that arrangement which is fitted to promote it, it will always appear in the highest degree contemptible and trifling. But we rarely view it in this abstract and philosophical light. We naturally confound it, in our imagination with the order, the regular and harmonious movement of the system, the machine or economy by means of which it is produced. The pleasures of wealth and greatness, when considered in this complex view, strike the imagination as something grand, and beautiful, and noble, of which the attainment is well worth all the toil and anxiety which we are so apt to bestow upon it.
And it is well that nature imposes upon us in this manner. It is this deception which rouses and keeps in continual motion the industry of mankind.”

Chap. I.
The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759), Part IV

George William Russell photo
Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo

“Beautiful language! Love's peculiar, own,
But only to the spring and summer known.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

The Oriental Nosegay. By Pickersgill
The Troubadour (1825)

Donald J. Trump photo
H. G. Wells photo
Elizabeth Bishop photo
Enver Hoxha photo
Eugene J. Martin photo
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis photo
Alex Steffen photo
Colum McCann photo
Max Barry photo
Lewis Pugh photo
Vinko Vrbanić photo
Lang Lang photo
Eugène Delacroix photo
Neal Stephenson photo

“Tris was pudgy and not especially good looking, but she had the personality of a beautiful girl because she'd been raised in a math.”

Part 10, "Messal." (A "math" is a co-ed academic/research monastery. Most of the novel takes place in maths.)
Anathem (2008)

Jerome David Salinger photo
Elie Wiesel photo

“What is abnormal is that I am normal. That I survived the Holocaust and went on to love beautiful girls, to talk, to write, to have toast and tea and live my life — that is what is abnormal.”

Elie Wiesel (1928–2016) writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust survivor

After being asked "What does it take to be normal again, after having your humanity stripped away by the Nazis?" in an interview in O : The Oprah Magazine (November 2000)

“This explains the instant satisfaction and growing reward which comes to every man who aspires to a higher life, who covets wisdom, who pursues beauty, who idealizes and worships his ideals.”

John William Lloyd (1857–1940) American anarchist, sexologist, utopian theorist and author (1857-1940)

Source: The Natural Man (1902), p. 100

Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo
Farhad Manjoo photo
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis photo

“His head was so beautiful. I tried to hold the top of his head down, maybe I could keep it in… but I knew he was dead.”

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (1929–1994) public figure, First Lady to 35th U.S. President John F. Kennedy

The "Camelot" interview (29 November 1963)

Gloria Estefan photo
Joel Spolsky photo

“People ridiculously overvalue aesthetics and beauty when evaluating products. It's one of the reasons iPods, and, for that matter, Keanu Reeves, are so successful.”

Joel Spolsky (1965) American blogger

"The Road to FogBugz 4.0: Part IV" http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/FogBugzIV.html

Yves Saint Laurent photo

“I have always believed that fashion was not made only to make women more beautiful, but also to reassure them, give them confidence.”

Yves Saint Laurent (1936–2008) fashion designer

As quoted in "50 Days of Everyday Fashion" in Yours magazine.

Mark Sanford photo

“I could digress and say that you have the ability to give magnificent gentle kisses, or that I love your tan lines or that I love the curve of your hips, the erotic beauty of you holding yourself (or two magnificent parts of yourself) in the faded glow of the night's light. but hey, that would be going into sexual details…”

Mark Sanford (1960) 115th Governor of South Carolina

From emails to Argentine mistress; reported in " Sanford-Maria e-mails shed light on governor's affair http://www.thestate.com/sanford/story/839350.html", The State (June 25, 2009).

Kameron Hurley photo
Thomas Traherne photo
Willem de Kooning photo
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe photo

“Just as, out of habit, one consults a run-down clock as though it were still going, so too one may look at the face of a beautiful woman as though she were still in love.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German writer, artist, and politician

Maxim 246, trans. Stopp
Maxims and Reflections (1833)

H.L. Mencken photo
Larry Hogan photo

“No state can match the beauty of the Chesapeake Bay, our beaches and farms, or the mountains of Western Maryland, the Port of Baltimore, or the historic charm of every corner of our state.”

Larry Hogan (1956) American politician

" State of the State Address: A New Direction for Maryland http://governor.maryland.gov/2015/02/04/state-of-the-state-address/" (4 February 2015)

E.E. Cummings photo

“completely dare
be beautiful”

E.E. Cummings (1894–1962) American poet

68
XAIPE (1950)

“I've rediscovered the part of my brain that can't decode anything, that can't add, that can't work from a verbalized concept, that doesn't care about stylish notation, that makes melodies that have pitch and rhythm, that doesn't know anything about zen eternity and gets bored and changes, that isn't worried about being commercial or avant-garde or serial or any other little category. Beauty is enough.”

Beth Anderson (1950) American neo-romantic composer

Variant quotes:
I've rediscovered the part of my brain that can't decode anything, that can't add, that can't work from a verbalized concept, that doesn't know anything about Zen eternity and gets bored and changes, that isn't worried about being commercial or avant-garde or serial or any other little category. Beauty is enough.
Beauty is Revolution (1980)
Source: Jane Weiner LePage (1983) Women composers, conductors, and musicians of the twentieth century: selected biographies. p. 14

Hans Arp photo
André Maurois photo
Octavius Winslow photo
Rufus Wainwright photo
Pierre-Auguste Renoir photo
Mellin de Saint-Gelais photo

“So you must always remember / that time ends the beauty”

Mellin de Saint-Gelais (1495–1558) French poet

Original: Ainsi vous doit-il souvenir / Que le temps finit la beauté
Source: Oeuvres poétiques

“I am one of the last of a small tribe of troubadours, who still believe that life is a beautiful and exciting journey with a purpose and grace which are well worth singing about.”

Yip Harburg (1896–1981) American song lyricist

As quoted in "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", by Scott Jacobs, in The Week Behind (23 September 2009).

William-Adolphe Bouguereau photo

“One has to seek Beauty and Truth, Sir! As I always say to my pupils, you have to work to the finish. There's only one kind of painting. It is the painting that presents the eye with perfection, the kind of beautiful and impeccable enamel you find in Veronese and Titian.”

William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825–1905) French painter

Bouguereau (1895); Attributed in: Jefferson C. Harrison (1986) French paintings from the Chrysler Museum. Chrysler Museum, North Carolina Museum of Art, Birmingham Museum of Art (Birmingham, Ala.). p.45.

Pierre Louis Maupertuis photo

“After so many great men have worked on this subject, I almost do not dare to say that I have discovered the universal principle upon which all these laws are based, a principle that covers both elastic and inelastic collisions and describes the motion and equilibrium of all material bodies.
This is the principle of least action, a principle so wise and so worthy of the supreme Being, and intrinsic to all natural phenomena; one observes it at work not only in every change, but also in every constancy that Nature exhibits. In the collision of bodies, motion is distributed such that the quantity of action is as small as possible, given that the collision occurs. At equilibrium, the bodies are arranged such that, if they were to undergo a small movement, the quantity of action would be smallest.
The laws of motion and equilibrium derived from this principle are exactly those observed in Nature. We may admire the applications of this principle in all phenomena: the movement of animals, the growth of plants, the revolutions of the planets, all are consequences of this principle. The spectacle of the universe seems all the more grand and beautiful and worthy of its Author, when one considers that it is all derived from a small number of laws laid down most wisely. Only thus can we gain a fitting idea of the power and wisdom of the supreme Being, not from some small part of creation for which we know neither the construction, usage, nor its relationship to other parts. What satisfaction for the human spirit in contemplating these laws of motion and equilibrium for all bodies in the universe, and in finding within them proof of the existence of Him who governs the universe!”

Pierre Louis Maupertuis (1698–1759) French mathematician, philosopher and man of letters

Les Loix du Mouvement et du Repos, déduites d'un Principe Métaphysique (1746)

Agatha Christie photo

“I will see beauty and goodness in all things. From all that is unlovely shall my vision be immune.”

Walter Russell (1871–1963) American philosopher

The Man who Tapped the Secrets of the Universe

T.S. Eliot photo
Thorstein Veblen photo