Quotes about eating
page 19

Brandon Flowers (American football) photo
Michele Simon photo
Muhammad photo
Steve-O photo

“As far as a compassionate lifestyle and [it being] healthy for me, for the planet and all the life on it, vegan is really the best way to go. It helps me a lot. I really believe that I'm doing something good for me and for everyone else every time I eat, you know.”

Steve-O (1974) England-born American stunt performer/radio personality

"Johnny Knoxville and Steve-O: Jackass 3D" https://www.suicidegirls.com/girls/nicole_powers/blog/2680298/johnny-knoxville-and-steve-o-jackass-3d/, interview with SuicideGirls (October 14, 2010).

Jeremy Corbyn photo

“Revenge leads to an empty fullness, like eating dirt.”

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist

The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Unclassified

George Herbert photo

“620. Before you make a friend eate a bushell of salt with him.”

George Herbert (1593–1633) Welsh-born English poet, orator and Anglican priest

Jacula Prudentum (1651)

Joseph Strutt photo
Leigh Hunt photo

“If you are ever at a loss to support a flagging conversation, introduce the subject of eating.”

Leigh Hunt (1784–1859) English critic, essayist, poet and writer

Table-talk: To which are Added Imaginary Conversations of Pope and Swift

Ernest Bramah photo

“Alas! It is well written, "The road to eminence lies through the cheap and exceedingly uninviting eating-houses."”

The Ill-Regulated Destiny of Kin Yen, the Picture-Maker
The Wallet of Kai Lung (1900)

John Fante photo
Christopher Moore photo

“Your mother eats fungus from the feet of lepers.”

Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal (2002)

Taj El-Din Hilaly photo
G. K. Chesterton photo
Michael Pollan photo

“Home cooking is good for you, and I eat out less. But that's the least of it. What has surprised me is how stimulating it is. How satisfying. You learn a lot about plants and animals. You begin to recognise your place in the world.”

Michael Pollan (1955) American author, journalist, activist, and professor of journalism

[Michael Pollan: Why the family meal is crucial to civilisation, Sat 25 May 2013, The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/may/25/michael-pollan-family-meal-civilisation, 2018-05-23]

Edward Carpenter photo
Vanna Bonta photo

“Why have a cake if I can't eat it?”

Vanna Bonta (1958–2014) Italian-American writer, poet, inventor, actress, voice artist (1958-2014)

Rewards of Passion (Sheer Poetry) (1981)

Norman Mailer photo
John Smith (explorer) photo

“You must obey this now for a Law, that he that will not worke shall not eate (except by sicknesse he be disabled:) for the labours of thirtie or fortie honest and industrious men shall not be consumed to maintaine an hundred and fiftie idle loyterers.”

John Smith (explorer) (1580–1631) Admiral of New England, was an English soldier, explorer, and author

Advice to his company when he was governor of Jamestown Colony, Virginia (1608); reported in The Generall Historie of Virginia, New England & The Summer Isles (1907), vol. 1, chapter 10, p. 174.

Ismail ibn Musa Menk photo

“Then we have Sūrat al-Sharḥ, also known as al-Inshirāḥ. I need to make mention of this because in it is a lot of comfort for myself and yourselves. We have a problem in life. When we have a problem Allah says, "Don't worry, with that difficulty, there is ease." You will never know what ease is all about unless you've been through difficulty. Those who have a beautiful life, sometimes they are still worried and depressed because they don't know what it is like to have suffered a little bit. So Allah's blessing, he makes us suffer slightly so that when there's a little bit of ease, mashallah. You know, a man who's always driven a Rolls-Royce will never know what it's like to ride a bicycle to work. Two ways of making them ride. One is, the doctor tells you you're about to die, Allahu Akbar, and you need to ride to work. Immediately everything is given up. Why? Because we're worried about dear life. That's why. If you see people – Subhan Allah – I've seen a man who had a carrot, and he was pretending like he's smoking this carrot and nibbling on it. And I told him, I said: "My brother, what made you nibble on this carrot?" He says: "My doctor told me I can't smoke, and a good replacement is a carrot." I said: "Allahu Akbar, you're stuffing your mouth with a carrot because of a doctor, but when Allah told you smoking is bad, then you didn't want to listen…" Allahu Akbar. May Allah make us from amongst those who eat carrots rather than smoking cigarettes. Really. So, my brothers and sisters, it's a reality. Whenever there is a person who has tasted goodness alone, and they don't know what difficulty is about, there comes a time when they do not appreciate what they have. So like I was saying, two ways. One is, Allah snatches it away from you, so you now have nothing. So many people have climbed the peak in terms of materialistic items, and then they've dropped down the mountain. They say it's easier to drop from the top than it is from the bottom. Allahu Akbar. When you arrive at the top, a small movement and you roll down, you're with the avalanche, one time. And when you're at the bottom, they can kick you – if you drop, you stand up again and you're walking – same level, masshalah, it's all about altitude. May Allah protect us. Another thing is, when you drop from the top, greater likelihood of breaking more bones. When you drop from the bottom, "Ah, I might have just hurt my head slightly", just say "Ouch" and carry on. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protect us and grant us humbleness. So, remember, sometimes Allah wants you to go down, so that you appreciate the bicycle after you had nothing, yet ten years ago you had the Rolls-Royce. May Allah bless us. So Allah says, and I'm sure we know verses, verse number five and six:
فَإِنَّ مَعَ الْعُسْرِ يُسْرً
إِنَّ مَعَ الْعُسْرِ يُسْرًا
"Indeed, with every difficulty [or, with difficulty] there is ease.
And indeed, with the difficulty there is ease."
[…] May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala alleviate the suffering that we are all going through in our own little ways. Remember it's a gift of Allah. To keep you in check sometimes. To keep you calling out to Him. May Allah open our doors.”

Ismail ibn Musa Menk (1975) Muslim cleric and Grand Mufti of Zimbabwe.

" Do you have problems in life? Watch This! by Mufti Menk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgp2zbE9Ofg", YouTube (2013)
Lectures

Thandie Newton photo

“While expressing my milk realised that the equivalent for cows is my milk going to the mouths of people who murder and eat my family #VEGAN”

Thandie Newton (1972) English actress

Tweet on Twitter (12 Jun 2014) https://twitter.com/thandienewton/status/477086748728905728. Also quoted in “PETA’s Sexiest Vegan Celebrities of 2014: Thandie Newton and David Haye Nab Top Honours!,” in Peta.org.uk (23 December 2014) http://www.peta.org.uk/blog/petas-sexiest-vegan-celebrities-2014-thandie-newton-david-haye-nab-top-honours/.

“I hope he slams into the side of the mountain and cougars eat his face.”

Radio From Hell (September 11, 2007)

Hugh Macmillan, Baron Macmillan photo
Ursula K. Le Guin photo

“Summon up a supper,” he said. “Oh, I could. On golden plates, if you like. But that’s illusion, and when you eat illusions you end up hungrier than before.”

Ursula K. Le Guin (1929–2018) American writer

Source: Earthsea Books, The Tombs of Atuan (1971), Chapter 11, "The Western Mountains"

Ali Khamenei photo
Gustav Mahler photo
William Golding photo
Karl Pilkington photo

“It's like the panda, they say that's dying out. But what do they do? When you see them they're just sitting in the jungle eating”

Karl Pilkington (1972) English television personality, social commentator, actor, author and former radio producer

3 Minute Wonder, Episode 1
On Nature

Donald J. Trump photo
Charles Lamb photo
Isaac Asimov photo

“Science Digest asked me to see the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind and write an article for them on the science it contained. I saw the picture and was appalled. I remained appalled even after a doctor’s examination had assured me that no internal organs had been shaken loose by its ridiculous soundwaves. (If you can’t be good, be loud, some say, and Close Encounters was very loud.) … Hollywood must deal with large audiences, most of whom are utterly unfamiliar with good science fiction. It has to bend to them, meet them at least half-way. Fully appreciating that, I could enjoy Planet of the Apes and Star Wars. Star Wars was entertainment for the masses and did not try to be anything more. Leave your sophistication at the door, get into the spirit, and you can have a fun ride. … Seeing a rotten picture for the special effects is like eating a tough steak for the smothered onions, or reading a bad book for the dirty parts. Optical wizardry is something a movie can do that a book can’t but it is no substitute for a story, for logic, for meaning. It is ornamentation, not substance. In fact, whenever a science fiction picture is praised overeffusively for its special effects, I know it’s a bad picture. Is that all they can find to talk about?”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

"Editorial: The Reluctant Critic", in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, Vol. 2, Issue 6, (12 November 1978) https://archive.org/stream/Asimovs_v02n06_1978-11-12/<!-- Asimovs_v02n06_1978-11-12_djvu.txt -->
General sources

Clarence Darrow photo

“I don’t like spinach, and I’m glad I don’t, because if I liked it I’d eat it, and I’d just hate it.”

Clarence Darrow (1857–1938) American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union

This quote was attributed to Darrow in the biography Clarence Darrow for the Defence (1949), but its earliest known source is from a journal entry of George Sand from 1835.
Misattributed

Thomas Morton (playwright) photo

“I eat well, and I drink well, and I sleep well—but that's all.”

Thomas Morton (playwright) (1764–1838) English playwright

A Roland for an Oliver (1819), Act I, scene i http://books.google.com/books?id=nWtbAAAAQAAJ&q=%22I+eat+well+and+I+drink+well+and+I+sleep+well+but+that's+all%22&pg=PA16#v=onepage.

Enes Kanter photo

“Maybe in June or July, I looked in the mirror. I’m like, ‘Man, I see a fat man. Look at that man, I feel fat.’ Not just feel fat, just look fat, too. I needed like a bra or something. I kept eating all this Turkish food. I was like, I need to stop doing it. I need to just — the season is coming. It’s a really important season for us. I need to be in shape.”

Enes Kanter (1992) Turkish basketball player

Interview https://twitter.com/ErikHorneOK/status/909508614259445760 with The Oklahoman’s Erik Horne (September 17, 2017); as quoted in "NBA players explain why they are going vegan and vegetarian" https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nba/nba-players-explain-why-they-are-going-vegan-and-vegetarian/ar-AAu21r4, MSN.com (October 25, 2017).

Umberto Veronesi photo
Eugene J. Martin photo

“Can someone eat the fruit that comes from the tree of action that grows from the seeds of your mind?”

Eugene J. Martin (1938–2005) American artist

from E.J. Martin's website at http://morayeel.louisiana.edu/ejMARTIN/ejMARTIN-artist.html and http://www.neoimages.net/statement.aspx?id=1312

Anastasia Ashley photo
Gautama Buddha photo
Bryan Adams photo

“My motto has always been “If you love animals, don’t eat them”…. the moment I began to understand what was going on with the treatment of animals, it led me more and more in the way of the path I am [on] now, which is a complete vegan.”

Bryan Adams (1959) Canadian singer-songwriter

“Bryan Adams on Animal Rights and Being Vegan”, interview with PETA, in Peta.org (7 January 2007) http://www.peta.org.uk/blog/bryan-adams-animal-rights-vegan/

Lisa Edelstein photo
Philip Kapleau photo
Ingrid Newkirk photo
Hereward Carrington photo
Anton Chekhov photo
Philip Kapleau photo
Dan Savage photo
Paul Klee photo

“[It].... is a real declaration of love toward art. Abstraction from this world more as a game, less as a failure of the earthly. Somewhere in between. The man in love no longer drinks and eats..”

Paul Klee (1879–1940) German Swiss painter

Diary entry (1912), # 922; as quoted by Francesco Mazzaferro, in 'The Diaries of Paul Klee Part Four', : Klee as an Expressionist and Constructivist Painter http://letteraturaartistica.blogspot.nl/2015/05/paul-klee-ev27.html
1911 - 1914

Barbara Ehrenreich photo
Benjamin Zephaniah photo

“Someone said that Capitalism will eat itself, and I think that’s like the meat industry, the meat industry itself will become dead meat and compassion will reign supreme.”

Benjamin Zephaniah (1958) English poet and author

"Zephaniah Speaks: Poetic Thoughts", interview with Arkangel Magazine (2002) reported in BenjaminZephaniah.com https://benjaminzephaniah.com/poetic-thoughts/?doing_wp_cron=1519050664.5827260017395019531250.

Dave Matthews photo

“So why would you care
To get out of this place?
You and me and all our friends,
Such a happy human race.
Eat, drink and be merry,
For tomorrow we die.”

Dave Matthews (1967) American singer-songwriter, musician and actor

Tripping Billies
Remember Two Things (1993)

Arsène Wenger photo

“If you eat caviar every day it's difficult to return to sausages.”

Arsène Wenger (1949) French footballer and manager

Arsenal 1-1 Middlesbrough (29 November 1998) http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-60615442.html
Interviews

Brian Clevinger photo
Charles Fillmore photo
Michael Savage photo

“The Lord… said: Unless a man shall eat my flesh, he shall not have in himself eternal life. Certain of his disciples, the seventy to wit, were scandalised, and said: This is a hard saying; who can understand it? And they departed from him, and walked with him no more. His saying… seemed to them a hard one. They received it foolishly: they thought of it carnally. For they fancied, that the Lord was going to cut from his own body certain morsels and to give those morsels to them. Hence they said: This is a hard saying. But they themselves were hard: not the saying. For, if, instead of being hard, they had been mild, they would have… learned from him what those learned, who remained while they departed. For, when the twelve disciples had remained with him after the others had departed,… he instructed them, and said unto them: It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing. The words, which I speak unto you, are spirit and life. As if he had said: Understand spiritually what I have spoken. You are Not about to eat this identical body, which you see; and you are Not about to drink this identical blood, which they who crucify me will pour out. I have commended unto you a certain sacrament. This, if spiritually understood, will quicken you. Though it must be celebrated visibly, it must be understood invisibly.”

George Stanley Faber (1773–1854) British theologian

Source: Christ's Discourse at Capernaum: Fatal to the Doctrine of Transubstantiation (1840), pp. 144-147

Allie (wrestler) photo
Jayne Mansfield photo

“We eat a lot of lean meat and fresh vegetables…. You are what you eat, you know. When I'm 100, I'll still be doing pin-ups.”

Jayne Mansfield (1933–1967) American actress, singer, model

Source: On Being Blonde (2004), p. 78

H. D. Deve Gowda photo

“I will not eat food from restaurants while campaigning. My party workers know my diet and keep ragi mudde (ragi balls and sambar ready before I reach the villages.”

H. D. Deve Gowda (1933) Indian politician

Source: Shyam Sundar Vattam "Gowda Lives on Ragi Mudde on the Campaign Trail".

Gregory Scott Paul photo
Lewis Mumford photo
Ingeborg Refling Hagen photo
Suvi Koponen photo
Ernesto Che Guevara photo

“Jews can't eat pork - surely anal delights are way higher up on the list of taboos.”

Kevin Keck (1973) American writer

"Ass Backwards" (p. 4)
Oedipus Wrecked (2005)

Peter Singer photo
Gautama Buddha photo
Prem Rawat photo
Heidi Klum photo

“I dont think it makes a difference if you have children or you don't have children. I think it's all in the head about how you feel and, I don't know, I always like to be active and work out and eat right and just be active so I never see it as, oh when you're a mom you can't be sexy or you cant be in lingerie anymore looking good.”

Heidi Klum (1973) German model, television host, businesswoman, fashion designer, television producer, and actress

Discussing modeling lingerie at age 35, quoted by Megan Glaros, WCBS-TV http://wcbstv.com/topstories/heidi.klum.victorias.2.879295.html, 3 December 2008

Bruce Friedrich photo
Bill Engvall photo
Gautama Buddha photo

“For fear of causing terror to living beings, Mahāmati, let the Bodhisattva who is disciplining himself to attain compassion, refrain from eating flesh.”

Gautama Buddha (-563–-483 BC) philosopher, reformer and the founder of Buddhism

Mahayana, Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, Chapter Eight. On Meat-eating

Jean Mayer photo

“In becoming a vegetarian, you will eat a greater percentage of your calories from cereal grains, dried beans and peas, potatoes and pasta—the very foods most dieters avoid with zeal. And you will lose weight.”

Jean Mayer (1920–1993) French-American scientist, university administrator

Quoted in "Why People Get Fat" by Keith Akers, Vegetarian Times (May 1983), p. 29 https://books.google.it/books?id=SQgAAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA29.

Dejan Stojanovic photo

“If unjustified, ambition kills value, eats its own life, kills someone else's desire to fly, cuts their wings, sucks their air.”

Dejan Stojanovic (1959) poet, writer, and businessman

Silent Equality http://www.poetrysoup.com/famous/poem/21405/Silent_Equality
From the poems written in English

Sarah Vowell photo
Daniel Handler photo
Frédéric Bastiat photo

“To produce 1 lb. of feedlot beef requires 7 lbs. of feed grain, which takes 7,000 lbs. of water to grow. Pass up one hamburger, and you'll save as much water as you save by taking 40 showers with a low-flow nozzle. Yet in the U. S., 70% of all the wheat, corn and other grain produced goes to feeding herds of livestock. Around the world, as more water is diverted to raising pigs and chickens instead of producing crops for direct consumption, millions of wells are going dry. … In the U. S., livestock now produce 130 times as much waste as people do. Just one hog farm in Utah, for example, produces more sewage than the city of Los Angeles. These megafarms are proliferating, and in populous areas their waste is tainting drinking water. In more pristine regions, from Indonesia to the Amazon, tropical rain forest is being burned down to make room for more and more cattle. … We, at least, have the flexibility—the omnivorous stomach and creative brain—to adapt. We can do it by moving down the food chain: eating foods that use less water and land, and that pollute far less, than cows and pigs do. In the long run, we can lose our memory of eating animals, and we will discover the intrinsic satisfactions of a diverse plant-based diet, as millions of people already have.”

Ed Ayres (1941) American magazine editor

"Will We Still Eat Meat?", in Time magazine (8 November 1999), pp. 1 http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,992523-1,00.html- 2 http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,992523-2,00.html.

Hillary Clinton photo

“It's not easy, it's not easy. And I couldn't do it if I just didn't, you know, passionately believe it was the right thing to do. You know, I've had so many opportunities from this country, I just don't want to see us fall backwards - no. So - you know, this is very personal for me. It's not just political, it's not just public. I see what's happening, and we have to reverse it. And some people think elections are a game, they think it's like who's up or who's down. It's about our country, it's about our kids' futures, and it's really about all of us together. You know some of us put ourselves out there and do this against some pretty difficult odds. And we do it, each one of us, because we care about our country. But some of us are right and some of us are wrong, some of us are ready and some of us are not, some of us know what we will do to do on day one and some of haven't really thought that through enough. And so when we look at the array of problems we have and the potential for it getting - really spinning out of control, this is one of the most important elections America's ever faced. So as tired as I am - and I am - and as difficult as it is to try to kind of keep up with what I try to do on the road like occasionally exercise and try to eat right - it's tough when the easiest food is pizza - I just believe so strongly in who we are as a nation. So I'm going to do everything I can to make my case and, you know, then the voters get to decide.”

Hillary Clinton (1947) American politician, senator, Secretary of State, First Lady

In response to the question, "How do you do it?" from Marianne Pernold The Washington Post http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/07/AR2008010702954.html
Presidential campaign (January 20, 2007 – 2008)

Martina Navrátilová photo

“I advocate eating nutritious food (I'm a vegetarian), working out, being in top form mentally and physically.”

Martina Navrátilová (1956) American-Czech tennis player

"Champion on Fair Play", in Ingrid Newkirk, One Can Make a Difference (Adams Media, 2008), pp. 172–73.

Scott Jurek photo
Anthony Burgess photo
Will Tuttle photo
Peter Atkins photo
Dustin Hoffman photo
Will Cuppy photo
Maureen Shea photo

“Animal products have no place in a healthy diet. As a champion boxer, I need to keep my body in top physical shape. Since I've stopped eating meat, I'm stronger, faster, and… happier! My whole life is better.”

Maureen Shea (1981) American boxer

Print ad for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (2008), in “Celebrities' Veggie Testimonials,” PETA.org https://www.peta.org/features/celebrities-veggie-testimonials/.

Bryant Jennings photo