Quotes about fame

A collection of quotes on the topic of fame, love, life, likeness.

Quotes about fame

“I can’t win. Love is Russian roulette for me. No one loves the real me inside. they're all in love with my fame, my stardom.
I fall in love far too quickly and end up getting hurt all the time. I've got scars all over. But I can't help myself because basically I'm a softie I have this hard, macho shell — which I project on stage but there's a much softer side. too, which melts like butter.”

Freddie Mercury (1946–1991) British singer, songwriter and record producer

"Rock On Freddie" (1985).

Love, Time, Help, Hurt

“I never cared about the money, that's not why I started acting, and I never liked the fame. The paparazzi culture is more pervasive than it used to be, kind of: 'Let's watch the actor pump gas.' It's nice not to have to worry about bills, though.
It's a cliche that money doesn't buy you happiness, but it does buy you the freedom to live your life the way you want.”

Keanu Reeves (1964) Canadian actor, director, producer and musician

Life, Money, Way, Freedom

“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.”

Henry David Thoreau book Walden ou la vie dans les bois

Source: Walden

Love, Money, Truth

“Fame does not define me. If you are looking for fame to define you, then you will never be happy and you’ll always be searching for happiness, and you will never find it in fame. Fulfillment comes from within you, by being authentic to yourself — not chasing fame.”

Cameron Diaz (1972) American actress

Human the movie: Cameron's interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-HvL3TSf-8 ( New York Post http://nypost.com/2015/12/17/cameron-diaz-fame-will-never-make-you-happy/)

Search, Happiness

“On whether there are any aspects of fame he dislikes: You kidding? I feel very fortunate. A lot of people would love to be in my position. There are so many people out there who are suffering trillions of times more than I could ever suffer, and would love to be me. I am a lucky little bastard.”

Leonardo DiCaprio (1974) American actor and film producer

Love, People, Feeling, Suffering

“Endurance is composed of four attributes: eagerness, fear, piety and anticipation (of death). so whoever is eager for Paradise will ignore temptations; whoever fears the fire of Hell will abstain from sins; whoever practices piety will easily bear the difficulties of life and whoever anticipates death will hasten towards good deeds.
Conviction has also four aspects to guard oneself against infatuations of sin; to search for explanation of truth through knowledge; to gain lessons from instructive things and to follow the precedent of the past people, because whoever wants to guard himself against vices and sins will have to search for the true causes of infatuation and the true ways of combating them out and to find those true ways one has to search them with the help of knowledge, whoever gets fully acquainted with various branches of knowledge will take lessons from life and whoever tries to take lessons from life is actually engaged in the study of the causes of rise and fall of previous civilizations.
Justice also has four aspects depth of understanding, profoundness of knowledge, fairness of judgment and dearness of mind; because whoever tries his best to understand a problem will have to study it, whoever has the practice of studying the subject he is to deal with, will develop a clear mind and will always come to correct decisions, whoever tries to achieve all this will have to develop ample patience and forbearance and whoever does this has done justice to the cause of religion and has led a life of good repute and fame.
Jihad is divided into four branches: to persuade people to be obedient to Allah; to prohibit them from sin and vice; to struggle (in the cause of Allah) sincerely and firmly on all occasions and to detest the vicious. Whoever persuades people to obey the orders of Allah provides strength to the believers; whoever dissuades them from vices and sins humiliates the unbelievers; whoever struggles on all occasions discharges all his obligations and whoever detests the vicious only for the sake of Allah, then Allah will take revenge on his enemies and will be pleased with Him on the Day of Judgment.”

Ali book Nahj al-Balagha

Nahj al-Balagha

Life, Death, People, Truth

“Success doesn't change you; fame does.”

Whitney Houston (1963–2012) American singer, actress, model, and record producer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPItgCnamNg

Change, Success

“The chain of young life is broken,
The journey is ended, the hour has struck, it is time to leave,
Time to go where there is no future,
No past, no eternity, no years;
Where there are no expectations, no passions,
No bitter tears, no fame, no honour;
Where memory sleeps deeply
And the heart in its narrow coffin home
Does not feel the worm gnawing it.”

Mikhail Lermontov (1814–1841) Russian writer, poet and painter

"Death" (1830 or 1831)
Poems

Life, Feeling, Home, Tear

“The general who advances without coveting fame and retreats without fearing disgrace, whose only thought is to protect his country and do good service for his sovereign, is the jewel of the kingdom.”

Sun Tzu (-543–-495 BC) ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty

Source: The Art of War, Chapter X · Terrain

Fear, Country

“Every one of us is going to die eventually, but we as a species will stick around for a while. That’s why I think accumulating money, fame or power is irrelevant. Serving humanity is the only thing that really matters in the long run.”

Pavel Durov (1984) Russian entrepreneur

" Why WhatsApp Will Never Be Secure https://telegra.ph/Why-WhatsApp-Will-Never-Be-Secure-05-15" 2019-05-15 In reference to his expatriation from Russia after refusing to breach the privacy of VK users for the government

Money, Thinking

“I believe that anyone can be successful in life, regardless of natural talent or the environment within which we live. This is not based on measuring success by human competitiveness for wealth, possessions, influence, and fame, but adhering to God's standards of truth, justice, humility, service, compassion, forgiveness, and love.”

Jimmy Carter (1924) American politician, 39th president of the United States (in office from 1977 to 1981)

Page 28
Post-Presidency, Our Endangered Values (2005)
Source: Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis

Love, Life, God, Truth

“My new knight mistress is famed for wielding sharp edges: Sword, Knife and Tongue!”

Tamora Pierce Squire

Source: Squire

“A person functioning exclusively in the Cartesian mode may be free from manifest symptoms but cannot be considered mentally healthy. Such individuals typically lead ego-centred, competitive, goal-oriented lives. Overpreoccupied with their past and their future, they tend to have a limited awarenessof the present and thus a limited ability to derive satisfaction from ordinary activities in everyday life. They concentrate on manipulating the external world and measure their living standard by the quantity of material possessions, while they become ever more alienated from their inner world and unable to appreciate the process of life. For people whose existence is dominated by this mode of experience no level of wealth, power, or fame will bring genuine satisfaction”

Fritjof Capra (1939) American physicist

Life, People, World, Past

“I was not intrigued with the accouterments of success and fame, the furs, jewels, expensive automobiles and mansions… I can assure you that these things were not on my mind when I sat spellbound in that Pozzuoli movie house. It was what these performers on the screen were doing, not what they received for doing it.”

Sophia Loren (1934) Italian actress

As quoted in Sophia, Living and Loving: Her Own Story (1979) by A. E. Hotchner, p. 63.

Success, Housing

“Lying in a featherbed
will not bring you fame, nor staying beneath the quilt,
and he who uses up his life without achieving fame
leaves no more vestige of himself on Earth
than smoke in the air or foam upon the water.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXIV, lines 47–51.
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

Life, Lying, Water

“I operate from a place of delusion-that’s what the Fame is all about… I want people to walk around delusional about how great they can be - and then to fight so hard for it every day that the lie becomes the truth.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

. "The Rise of Lady Gaga." by Brian Hiatt, in Rolling Stone (11 June 2009): 57-61.

People, Truth, Lie, Fight

“Fame is drag. The paparazzi culture is more pervasive than it used to be. On the positive side, it’s nice not to have to worry about bills.”

Keanu Reeves (1964) Canadian actor, director, producer and musician

“The more fame I gain, the more humble I become.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“We don’t do what we do for the glory or the fame or the credit; we do it for the quiet satisfaction of making the world a better place, saving the lives of innocents, and being better than you are.”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Dark Days

World

“Talent is God-given; be humble. Fame is man-given; be thankful. Conceit is self-given; be careful.”

John Wooden (1910–2010) American basketball coach

They Call Me Coach (1972)
Variant: Talent is God-given; be humble. Fame is man-given; be thankful. Conceit is self-given; be careful.

God

“Fame or infamy, either one is preferable to being forgotten when you have passed from this realm.”

Christopher Paolini book Brisingr

Source: Brisingr

“The worker must work for the glory of his handiwork, not simply for pay; the thinker must think for truth, not for fame.”

W.E.B. Du Bois book The Souls of Black Folk

Source: The Souls of Black Folk (1903), Ch. V: Of the Wings of Atalanta

Truth, Thinking

“The human bird shall take his first flight, filling the words with amazement, all writings with his fame, and bringing eternal glory to those whose nest whence he sprang.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

Bird

“Give me hunger, pain and want,
Shut me out with shame and failure
From your doors of gold and fame,
Give me your shabbiest, weariest hunger!

But leave me a little love.”

Carl Sandburg book Chicago Poems

Source: Chicago Poems

Love, Hunger, Pain, Failure

“I remember thinking I just want more. This isn't it. Fame is not the goal. Money is not the goal. To be able to know how to get peace of mind, how to be happy, is something you don't just stumble across. You've got to search for it.”

George Harrison (1943–2001) British musician, former member of the Beatles

Money, Peace, Search, Thinking

“This is part of what a family is about, not just love. It's knowing that your family will be there watching out for you. Nothing else will give you that. Not money. Not fame. Not work.”

Mitch Albom Tuesdays with Morrie

Source: Tuesdays with Morrie

Love, Money, Family, Parting

“Make your ego porous. Will is of little importance, complaining is nothing, fame is nothing. Openness, patience, receptivity, solitude is everything.”

Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) Austrian poet and writer

As quoted in Sunbeams : A Book of Quotations (1990) by Sy Safransky, p. 42

Solitude, Patience

“Fame is a vapor; popularity an accident; the only earthly certainty is oblivion.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

p. 114 http://books.google.com/books?id=qCDpAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Fame+is+a+vapor+popularity+an+accident+the+only+earthly+certainty+is+oblivion%22&pg=PA114#v=onepage Mark Twain's Notebook (1935)

“Even those who write against fame wish for the fame of having written well, and those who read their works desire the fame of having read them.”

Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer, and Christian philosopher

Reading

“When I was a boy a farmer's wife who lived five miles from our village had great fame as a faith-doctor—that was what she called herself. Sufferers came to her from all around, and she laid her hand upon them and said, "Have faith—it is all that is necessary," and they went away well of their ailments. She was not a religious woman, and pretended to no occult powers. She said that the patient's faith in her did the work. Several times I saw her make immediate cures of severe toothaches. My mother was the patient. In Austria there is a peasant who drives a great trade in this sort of industry, and has both the high and the low for patients. He gets into prison every now and then for practising without a diploma, but his business is as brisk as ever when he gets out, for his work is unquestionably successful and keeps his reputation high. In Bavaria there is a man who performed so many great cures that he had to retire from his profession of stage-carpentering in order to meet the demand of his constantly increasing body of customers. He goes on from year to year doing his miracles, and has become very rich. He pretends to no religious helps, no supernatural aids, but thinks there is something in his make-up which inspires the confidence of his patients, and that it is this confidence which does the work, and not some mysterious power issuing from himself.”

Mark Twain Christian Science

Source: Christian Science (1907), Ch. 4

Faith, Confidence, Boy, Business

“Little children play with dolls in the outer room just as they like, without any care of fear or restraint; but as soon as their mother comes in, they throw aside their dolls and run to her crying, "Mamma, mamma." You too, are now playing in this material world, infatuated with the dolls of wealth, honour, fame, etc., If however, you once see your Divine Mother, you will not afterwards find pleasure in all these. Throwing them all aside, you will run to her.”

Ramakrishna (1836–1886) Indian mystic and religious preacher

Source: Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna (1960), p. 12

Children, Pleasure, World, Fear

“Fame opportunely despised often comes back redoubled.”

Livy (-59–17 BC) Roman historian

Book II, sec. 47
History of Rome

“I think the worst thing that can happen to a good actor is fame. The limelight is a tricky place, because you can't believe what's going on around you. You stop observing. You stop perceiving. You stop extending yourself, and you become isolated. Our duty as actors is to remain compassionate and curious. Fame complicates all that.”

Vera Farmiga (1973) American actress

As quoted in " A Film of One's Own http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/03/magazine/03actesses.html" by Lynn Hirschberg at The New York Times (September 3, 2006)

Thinking

“Hearing, one day, that a poor young girl of her acquaintance had been enticed to a fashionable house of ill-fame, she ran to the place, entered the house, and claimed the girl. She found there several gentlemen of the Court, whom she rebuked with a severity, the justice of which they confessed by sudden and precipitate flight; she then took the young girl by the hand and led her from the abode of shame.”

Josephine Butler (1828–1906) British feminist

1874 https://attackingthedevil.co.uk/related/thoughts.php

Justice, Girl, Fashion, Housing

“Love is important, and woman being shrewd bargainers probably know fame is not worth much. I’d much rather have something I can spend, eat, or love, thank you very much”

Alice Borchardt book The Dragon Queen

The Dragon Queen

Love

“When that which loves is united to the thing beloved it can rest there; when the burden is laid down it finds rest there. There will be eternal fame also for the inhabitants of that town, constructed and enlarged by him.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.

Love

“A mans fame and hayre grow most after death, and are both equally uselesse.”

George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham (1628–1687) English statesman and poet

Source: Commonplace book, P. 268

Death

“I stand here waiting for you to bang the gong, to crash the critic saying
Is it right or is it wrong?
If only fame had an IV,
Baby could I bear being away from you?
I found the vein, put it in here.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

Applause, written by Lady Gaga, Paul Blair, Dino Zisis, Nick Monson, Nicolas Mercier, Julien Arias, and William Grigahcine
Song lyrics, Artpop (2013)

Waiting, Baby

“Religion can get on with any sort of astronomy, geology, biology, physics. But it cannot get on with a purposeless and meaningless universe. If the scheme of things is purposeless and meaningless, then the life of man is purposeless and meaningless too. Everything is futile, all effort is in the end worthless. A man may, of course, still pursue disconnected ends, money, fame, art, science, and may gain pleasure from them. But his life is hollow at the center. Hence the dissatisfied, disillusioned, restless, spirit of modern man.”

Walter Terence Stace (1886–1967) British civil servant, educator and philosopher.

p.7-6.

Life, Money, Pleasure, Religion

“He that hath once got the fame of an early riser, may sleep till noon.”

James Howell (1594–1666) Anglo-Welsh historian and writer

Source: [Howell, James, Epistolae Ho-Elianae, https://books.google.com/books?id=v79CAAAAcAAJ&q=%22till%20noon%22, Google Books, 1655 Edition, 20 September 2016]

Sleep

“In addition to the animal essence, we have something that is above animal existence. This something is called our egoism. It is based on our aspirations to wealth, honor, fame, power, and knowledge. Animals do not have these aspirations […] — envy, inclination to pleasures, and aspiration to honor. These aspirations bring a person to a level above the animal. Since they are above animal qualities, these aspirations and qualities are praiseworthy. On the other hand, their common natural utilization puts us below all other levels”

Yehuda Ashlag (1886–1954) Orthodox Jewish Rabbi and Kabbalist

i.e. still, vegetative, and animate
Introduction to the Book of Zohar, in Introduction to the Book of Zohar: Volume Two, Michael Laitman, ed., Laitman Kabbalah Publishers, 2005, p. 94.
Introduction to the Book of Zohar

Pleasure, Nature, Knowledge, Animals

“To this end we now need many preparatory courageous human beings who cannot very well leap out of nothing — any more than out of the sand and slime of present-day civilization and metropolitanism: human beings who know how to be silent, lonely, resolute, and content and constant in invisible activities; human beings who are bent on seeking in all things for what in them must be overcome; human beings distinguished as much by cheerfulness, patience, unpretentiousness, and contempt for all great vanities as by magnanimity in victory and forbearance regarding the small vanities of the vanquished; human beings whose judgment concerning all victors and the share of chance in every victory and fame is sharp and free; human beings with their own festivals, their own working days, and their own periods of mourning, accustomed to command with assurance but instantly ready to obey when that is called for, equally proud, equally serving their own cause in both cases; more endangered human beings, more fruitful human beings, happier beings!”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

The Gay Science (1882)

Courage, Chance, Victory, Patience

“I've been in the public eye for nine years, and I've gone through different phases with it. At first I loved it. Finally, there's a light shining on me and I've wanted that all this time. Then there were a couple of years where I almost became reclusive because it bothered me so much. The trick is to be able to look at it as something that's ethereal and not real. Fame, or whatever that is, isn't tangible. You can't hang your hat on it. You must be able to sit under your covers and giggle about the nonsense of all of it.”

Matthew Perry (actor) (1969) American actor

Newsday staff (September 13, 2002) "START / Fast Chat Matthew Perry", Newsday, Newsday Inc., p. D03.

Love, Light, Time

“The city will gain beauty worthy of its name and to you it will be useful by its revenues, and the eternal fame of its aggrandizement.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

These notes were possibly written in preparation for a letter. The meaning is obscure.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.

Beauty

“In general they are intoxicated by the fame of mass culture, a fame which the latter knows how to manipulate; they could just as well get together in clubs for worshipping film stars or for collecting autographs. What is important to them is the sense of belonging as such, identification, without paying particular attention to its content. As girls, they have trained themselves to faint upon hearing the voice of a 'crooner'. Their applause, cued in by a light-signal, is transmitted directly on the popular radio programmes they are permitted to attend. They call themselves 'jitter-bugs', bugs which carry out reflex movements, performers of their own ecstasy. Merely to be carried away by anything at all, to have something of their own, compensates for their impoverished and barren existence. The gesture of adolescence, which raves for this or that on one day with the ever-present possibility of damning it as idiocy on the next, is now socialized.”

Theodor W. Adorno (1903–1969) German sociologist, philosopher and musicologist known for his critical theory of society

Perennial fashion — Jazz, as quoted in The Sociology of Rock (1978) by Simon Frith,

Girl, Star, Sense, Light

“If it took Labouchere three columns to prove that I was forgotten, then there is no difference between fame and obscurity.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

As quoted in The New-York Herald (12 August 1883) http://www.oscarwildeinamerica.org/quotations/fame-and-obscurity.html

“Virtue has her heroes too
As well as Fame and Fortune.”

Friedrich Schiller Wallenstein

Act I, sc. vii
Wallenstein (1798), Part II - Wallensteins Tod (The Death of Wallenstein)

“Fame alone raises herself to Heaven, because virtuous things are in favour with God.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), X Studies and Sketches for Pictures and Decorations

God

“Between the first and second Passover John and Christ baptized together, till the imprisonment of John, which was four months before the second. Then Christ began to preach, and call his disciples; and after he had instructed them a year, lent them to preach in the cities of the Jews: at the same time John hearing of the fame of Christ, sent to him to know who he was. At the third, the chief Priests began to consult about the death of Christ. A little before the fourth, the twelve after they had preached a year in all the cities, returned to Christ; and at the same time Herod beheaded John in prison, after he had been in prison two years and a quarter: and thereupon Christ fled into the desert for fear of Herod. The fourth Christ went not up to Jerusalem for fear of the Jews, who at the Passover before had consulted his death, and because his time was not yet come. Thenceforward therefore till the feast of Tabernacles he walked in Galilee, and that secretly for fear of Herod: and after the feast of Tabernacles he returned no more into Galilee, but sometimes was at Jerusalem, and sometimes retired beyond Jordan, or to the city Ephraim by the wilderness, till the Passover in which he was betrayed, apprehended, and crucified.”

Isaac Newton (1643–1727) British physicist and mathematician and founder of modern classical physics

Vol. I, Ch. 11: Of the Times of the Birth and Passion of Christ
Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John (1733)

Death, Fear, Time, Christ

“If he cannot stop the mind that seeks after fame and profit, he will spend his life without finding peace.”

Dogen (1200–1253) Japanese Zen buddhist teacher

VI, 9
Shobogenzo Zuimonki (1238)

Life, Peace

“As soon as an opinion becomes common it is sufficient reason for men to abandon it and to uphold the opposite opinion until that in its turn grows old, and they require to distinguish themselves by other things. Thus if they attain their goal in some art or science, we must expect them soon to cast it aside to acquire some fresh fame, and this is partly the reason why the most splendid ages degenerate so quickly, and, scarcely emerged from barbarism, plunge into it again.”

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–1747) French writer, a moralist

Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 179.

Men, Age, Art, Science

“People say of such-and-such a painter that he has great command of his brush. Might it not be more correct to say that he is controlled of his brush? Merely for the satisfaction of his vanity, to paint brilliantly and display skill with the brush, he has sacrificed the nobler considerations of naturalness and truth – and thus achieved sorry fame as a brilliant technician.”

Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840) Swedish painter

Quote from his writings Thoughts on Art, Caspar David Friedrich; as cited in Letters of the great artists – from Blake to Pollock, Richard Friedenthal, Thames and Hudson, London, 1963, p. 32
undated

People, Truth, Nature, Painting

“Men the most infamous are fond of fame,
And those who fear not guilt yet start at shame.”

Charles Churchill (satirist) (1731–1764) British poet

The Author (1763), line 233

Men, Fear

““A lot of people would say to me, “So Chris, you were bullied in high school and now you’re famous, so you've had a Cinderella story.” And I’d think, “What? Are you kidding?” Fame is not a solution. I’m a Cinderella story because I was in an unfortunate situation, and now I’m in a place where I get to do what I love.””

Chris Colfer (1990) actor, singer, book author

Interview Quotes, Random Quotes

Love, People, School, Thinking

“And also to the alien, who is not of Thy people Israel, but comes from a distant land on account of Thy fame; for hearing of Thy great name and Thy strong hand, and Thine outstretched arm, he comes to this house to pray… do Thou listen in the heavens, the place where Thou dwellest, and perform all that the alien begs of Thee, so that all the peoples of the earth may know Thy name, to fear Thee like Thine own people Israel, and to know that Thy name is proclaimed over this house that I have built.”

Solomon (-990–-931 BC) king of Israel and the son of David

I Kings 8:41-43 on the dedication of the Temple in Jerusalem

People, Fear, Strong, Distant

“Let the dead have the immortality of fame, but the living the immortality of love.”

Rabindranath Tagore Stray Birds

280
Stray Birds (1916)

Love, Dead

“I firmly believe that the higher [spiritual] experience can to a certain extent be prepared for by absolute devotion in the material world to another human being. Thus from the most worldly point of view and with no comprehension of the higher life of the spirit, the lower, more terrestrial spirit makes us aware that all the treasures of this life, all that fame, wealth and health can bring are nothing beside the happiness which is created and sustained by the love of one human being for another… but as the joys of human love surpass all that riches and power may bring a man, so does that greater spiritual love and enlightenment, the fruit of that sublime experience of the direct vision of reality which is God's gift and grace, surpass all that the finest, truest human love can offer.”

Aga Khan III (1877–1957) 48th Imam of the Nizari Ismaili community

Memoirs of Aga Khan: World Enough & Time (1954)

Love, Life, God, Health

“In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted — for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things — some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom. […] Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2009, First Inaugural Address (January 2009)

Life, Women, Men, Pleasure

“I, Titian of Cadore, having studied painting from childhood upwards, and desirous of fame rather than profit, wish to serve the Doge and Signori, rather than his Highness the Pope and other Signori, who in past days, and even now, have urgently asked to employ me: I am therefore anxious, if it should appear feasible, to paint in the Hall of Council, beginning, if it please their sublimity, with the canvas of 'The Battle' on the side towards the Piazza, which is so difficult that no one as yet has had courage to attempt it…”

Titian (1488–1576) Italian painter

Quote from a petition presented by Titian, and read on the 31st of May, 1513, before the Council of ten of Venice; as quoted by J.A.Y. Crowe & G.B. Cavalcaselle in Titian his life and times - With some account..., publisher John Murray, London, 1877, p. 153-154
The chiefs of the Council on the day in question accepted Titian's offer. Sharp monitions reminded him in 1518, 1522 and 1537 that he should complete 'The Battle', he did not until 1539
1510-1540
Source: http://www.everypainterpaintshimself.com/article/titians_battle_of_cadore_1538-9

Courage, Study, Appearance, Past

“On valour's side the odds of combat lie,
The brave live glorious, or lamented die;
The wretch who trembles in the field of fame,
Meets death, and worse than death, eternal shame.”

Homér Iliad

XV. 563–564 (tr. Alexander Pope).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Death, Lie

“Therefore the Sage embraces the One,
And becomes the model of the world.
He does not reveal himself,
And is therefore luminous.
He does not justify himself,
And is therefore far-famed.
He does not boast himself,
And therefore people give him credit.
He does not pride himself,
And is therefore the ruler among men.
It is because he does not contend
That no one in the world can contend against him.”

Laozi book Tao Te Ching

Source: Tao Te Ching, Ch. 22, as translated by Lin Yutang (1948)

Men, People, World

“Amidst all of these flashing lights I pray The Fame wont take my life.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

Performing "Paparazzi" in MTV VMA'S '09.

Life, Light

“Pyaar Kii Ye Ek Kahaani has given me the opportunity to explore as an actor and has won me lots of recognition and fame. I am grateful to the show. It has been a lovely journey till date. I love my director Partho sir who makes each day on the sets a memorable one. I also love my co-actors. In fact I love everything about the show.”

Sukirti Kandpal (1987) Indian actress

On her shows Source: On Pyaar Kii Ye Ek Kahaani http://www.tellychakkar.com/tv/interviews/i-am-very-much-single-and-definitely-not-married-sukirti-kandpal/

Love

“Some might consider him as too fond of fame; for the desire for glory clings even to the best men longer than any other passion.”

Tacitus book Histories

Book IV, 6
Histories (100-110)

Men, Passion

“I insist on keeping a level head. I`ve maintained the same exact home life that I`ve had for 20 years. All I see is more people looking at me than before. But, you know, who cares? You just can`t obsess yourself with this fame stuff.”

Leonardo DiCaprio (1974) American actor and film producer

Life, People, Home

“But if you think that life can be prolonged by the breath of mortal fame, yet when the slow time robs you of this too, then there awaits you but a second death.”
Quodsi putatis longius vitam trahi mortalis aura nominis, cum sera vobis rapiet hoc etiam dies iam vos secunda mors manet.

Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius (480) philosopher of the early 6th century

Poem VII, lines 23-26; translation by W. V. Cooper
The Consolation of Philosophy · De Consolatione Philosophiae, Book II

Life, Death, Thinking, Time

“He who conquers his enemy with meekness, wins fame.”

Paracelsus (1493–1541) Swiss physician and alchemist

Paracelsus - Doctor of our Time (1992)

“Men crowd into honorable careers without other vocation than their vanity, or at best their love of fame.”

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–1747) French writer, a moralist

Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 185.

Love, Men

“Hidden away amongst Aschenbach’s writing was a passage directly asserting that nearly all the great things that exist owe their existence to a defiant despite: it is despite grief and anguish, despite poverty, loneliness, bodily weakness, vice and passion and a thousand inhibitions, that they have come into being at all. But this was more than an observation, it was an experience, it was positively the formula of his life and his fame, the key to his work.”

Thomas Mann book Death in Venice

Source: Death in Venice (1912), Ch. 2, as translated by David Luke

Life, Passion, Loneliness

“Fortune, which had never forsaken him in his lifetime, favored the King of Sweden even in his death, with the rare privilege of falling in the fullness of his glory and an untarnished fame. By a timely death, his protecting genius rescued him from the inevitable fate of man - that of forgetting moderation in the intoxication of success, and justice in the plenitude of power.”

Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright

History of the Thirty YEars War 178
The Thirty Years War

Death, Fate, Justice, Time

“On the battlefield of justice, men and women without rank or wealth or title or fame would liberate us all in ways that our children now take for granted, as people of all colors and creeds live together and learn together and walk together, and fight alongside one another, and love one another, and judge one another by the content of our character in this greatest nation on Earth.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2013, "Let Freedom Ring" Ceremony (August 2013)

Love, Women, Men, Children

“The world would be a happier place than it is if acquisitiveness were always stronger than rivalry. But in fact, a great many men will cheerfully face impoverishment if they can thereby secure complete ruin for their rivals. Hence the present level of taxation.
Vanity is a motive of immense potency. Anyone who has much to do with children knows how they are constantly performing some antic, and saying "Look at me." "Look at me" is one of the most fundamental desires of the human heart. It can take innumerable forms, from buffoonery to the pursuit of posthumous fame.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

1950s, What Desires Are Politically Important? (1950)

Men, Children, World, Motivation

“The fame thing is interesting because I never wanted to be famous, and I never dreamt I would be famous.
I imagined being a famous writer would be like being like Jane Austen. Being able to sit at home in the parsonage and your books would be very famous and occasionally you would correspond with the Prince of Wales's secretary.
You know I didn't think they'd rake through my bins, I didn't expect to be photographed on the beach through long lenses. I never dreamt it would impact my daughter's life negatively, which at times it has.”

Joanne K. Rowling (1965) British novelist, author of the Harry Potter series

As quoted in an interview with Jeremy Paxman, on Newsnight, as quoted in 'Harry is a lot, lot, lot angrier in this book' in The Telegraph (20 June 2003) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/fictionreviews/3596993/Harry-is-a-lot-lot-lot-angrier-in-this-book.html) 2000s

Life, Books, Home, Imagination

“The favorites of fortune or of fame topple from their pedestals before our eyes without diverting us from ambition.”

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–1747) French writer, a moralist

Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 180.

“The world has held great Heroes,
As history books have showed;
But never a name to go down to fame
Compared with that of Toad!”

Kenneth Grahame book The Wind in the Willows

Source: The Wind in the Willows (1908), Ch. 10, "The Further Adventures Of Toad"

Books, World, History

“Accounts of outrages committed by mobs form the every-day news of the times. They have pervaded the country from New England to Louisiana, they are neither peculiar to the eternal snows of the former nor the burning suns of the latter; they are not the creature of climate, neither are they confined to the slaveholding or the non-slaveholding States. Alike they spring up among the pleasure-hunting masters of Southern slaves, and the order-loving citizens of the land of steady habits. Whatever then their cause may be, it is common to the whole country. […] Such are the effects of mob law, and such are the scenes becoming more and more frequent in this land so lately famed for love of law and order, and the stories of which have even now grown too familiar to attract anything more than an idle remark. But you are perhaps ready to ask, "What has this to do with the perpetuation of our political institutions?" I answer, "It has much to do with it."”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Its direct consequences are, comparatively speaking, but a small evil, and much of its danger consists in the proneness of our minds to regard its direct as its only consequences.
1830s, The Lyceum Address (1838)

Love, Pleasure, Law, Spring

“The best critics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries demand perfect rhyming, and no aspirant for fame can afford to depart from a standard so universal. It is evidently the true goal of the English, as well as of the French bard; the goal from which we are but temporarily deflected during the preceding age.
But exceptions should and must be made in the case of a few who have somehow absorbed the atmosphere of other days, and who long in their hearts for the stately sound of the old classic cadences. Well may their predilection for imperfect rhyming be discouraged to a limited extent, but to chain them wholly to modern rules would be barbarous. Every limited mind demands a certain freedom of expression, and the man who cannot express himself satisfactorily without the stimulation derived from the spirited mode of two centuries ago should certainly be permitted to follow without undue restraint a practice so harmless, so free from essential error, and so sanctioned by precedent, as that of employing in his poetical compositions the smooth and inoffensive allowable rhyme.”

H.P. Lovecraft (1890–1937) American author

The Allowable Rhyme (1915)
Non-Fiction

Age, Error, Freedom, Universe

“I don't worry too much about the choices I've made. When my days are over I'll have to answer for everything I've done. I don't grieve in any way about bad consequences for things I've done in my life.”

Lawrence Taylor (1959) All-American college football player, professional football player, linebacker, Pro Football Hall of Fame member

in 1999 before he was inducted in the Hall of Fame.

Life, Way

“Fame for me is not external, it’s internal. So I’ve been famous for a long time.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

Time

“My ideas about fame and art are not brand new … We could watch Paris is Burning, we could read The Warhol Diaries, we could go to a party in New York in 1973 and these same things would be being talked about. I guess you could say that I'm a bit of a Warholian copycat.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

The world goes crazy for Lady Gaga (2009)
Context: My ideas about fame and art are not brand new … We could watch Paris is Burning, we could read The Warhol Diaries, we could go to a party in New York in 1973 and these same things would be being talked about. I guess you could say that I'm a bit of a Warholian copycat. Some people say everything has been done before, and to an extent they are right. I think the trick is to honour your vision and reference and put together things that have never been put together before. I like to be unpredictable, and I think it's very unpredictable to promote pop music as a highbrow medium.

Art, Idea, Reading

“Fame is love disguised.”

Percy Bysshe Shelley Prometheus Unbound; a lyrical drama in four acts with other poems/An Exhortation

An Exhortation (1819), st. 2

Love

“I shall carry with me to the grave the most grateful recollections of your kind consideration and your name and fame will always be dear to me. Save for defense of my native state, I never desire again to draw my sword.”

Robert E. Lee (1807–1870) Confederate general in the Civil War

Letter to General Winfield Scott (20 April 1861) after turning down an offer by Abraham Lincoln of supreme command of the U.S. Army; as quoted in Personal Reminiscences, Anecdotes, and Letters of Gen. Robert E. Lee (1875) by John William Jones, p. 139
1860s
Context: Since my interview with you on the 18th I have felt that I ought not longer retain my commission in the Army … It would have been presented at once, but for the struggle, it has cost me to separate myself from a service to which I have devoted all the best years of my life, and all the ability I possessed … I shall carry with me to the grave the most grateful recollections of your kind consideration and your name and fame will always be dear to me. Save for defense of my native state, I never desire again to draw my sword.

Drawing

“The outlet for my work is not just the music and the videos, it's every breathing moment of my life. I'm always saying something about art and music and fame.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

The world goes crazy for Lady Gaga (2009)
Context: I don't want to see Bowie in a tracksuit. He never let anyone see him that way. The outlet for my work is not just the music and the videos, it's every breathing moment of my life. I'm always saying something about art and music and fame. That's why you don't ever catch me in sweatpants.

Life, Art, Music

“Let my delight be the country, and the running streams amid the dells—may I love the waters and the woods, though I be unknown to fame.”
Rura mihi et rigui placeant in vallibus amnes, Flumina amem sylvasque inglorius.

Virgil Georgics

Book II, lines 485–486 (tr. Fairclough)
Georgics (29 BC)

Love, Water, Country

“Towering genius disdains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored. — It sees no distinction in adding story to story, upon the monuments of fame, erected to the memory of others. It denies that it is glory enough to serve under any chief. It scorns to tread in the footsteps of any predecessor, however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Often the portion of this passage on "Towering genius..." is quoted without any mention or acknowledgment that Lincoln was speaking of the need to sometimes hold the ambitions of such genius in check, when individuals aim at their own personal aggrandizement rather than the common good.
1830s, The Lyceum Address (1838)
Context: It is to deny, what the history of the world tells us is true, to suppose that men of ambition and talents will not continue to spring up amongst us. And, when they do, they will as naturally seek the gratification of their ruling passion, as others have so done before them. The question then, is, can that gratification be found in supporting and maintaining an edifice that has been erected by others? Most certainly it cannot. Many great and good men sufficiently qualified for any task they should undertake, may ever be found, whose ambition would inspire to nothing beyond a seat in Congress, a gubernatorial or a presidential chair; but such belong not to the family of the lion, or the tribe of the eagle. What! think you these places would satisfy an Alexander, a Caesar, or a Napoleon? — Never! Towering genius disdains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored. — It sees no distinction in adding story to story, upon the monuments of fame, erected to the memory of others. It denies that it is glory enough to serve under any chief. It scorns to tread in the footsteps of any predecessor, however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction; and, if possible, it will have it, whether at the expense of emancipating slaves, or enslaving freemen. Is it unreasonable then to expect, that some man possessed of the loftiest genius, coupled with ambition sufficient to push it to its utmost stretch, will at some time, spring up among us? And when such a one does, it will require the people to be united with each other, attached to the government and laws, and generally intelligent, to successfully frustrate his designs.

Memory

“The best people renounce all for one goal, the eternal fame of mortals; but most people stuff themselves like cattle.”

Heraclitus (-535) pre-Socratic Greek philosopher

People

“Fame had brought me so much unhappiness.”

Brigitte Bardot (1934) French model, actor, singer and animal rights activist

“The best known names in the Territory of Nevada were those belonging to these long-tailed heroes of the revolver. Orators, Governors, capitalists and leaders of the legislature enjoyed a degree of fame, but it seemed local and meagre when contrasted with the fame of such men as Sam Brown, Jack Williams, Billy Mulligan, Farmer Pease, Sugarfoot Mike, Pock-Marked Jake, El Dorado Johnny, Jack McNabb, Joe McGee, Jack Harris, Six-fingered Pete, etc., etc.”

Mark Twain book Roughing It

Chapter XLVIII, p. 344 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo1.ark:/13960/t0xp7k74t&view=1up&seq=364' (published 1872) Roughing It (1872)

Men

“While fame impedes and constricts, obscurity wraps about a man like a mist; obscurity is dark, ample, and free; obscurity lets the mind take its way unimpeded. Over the obscure man is poured the merciful suffusion of darkness. None knows where he goes or comes. He may seek the truth and speak it; he alone is free; he alone is truthful, he alone is at peace.”

Virginia Woolf book Orlando: A Biography

Source: Orlando: A Biography (1928), Ch. 2

Way, Truth, Peace

“I do not wish to be a king; I am not anxious to be rich; I decline military command; I detest fornication; I am not impelled by an insatiable love of gain to go to sea; I do not contend for chaplets; I am free from a mad thirst for fame; I despise death; I am superior to every kind of disease; grief does not consume my soul.”

Tatian (120–180) Syrian writer

Original: (la) Regnare nolo: ditescere non libet: prae turam recuso, scortationem odi: navigare ob insatiabilem avaritiam non cupio: de coronis consequendis non dimico: liber sum ab insana gloria cupiditate: mortem contemno: guovis morbi genere superior sum: maror animum non peredit.
Source: Address to the Greeks, Chapter XI, as translated by J. E. Ryland

Soul, Love, Making love, Madness

“The measure of fame that I have is kind of like micro fame, relative to a certain kind of community of people. It’s awful. It’s horrible. I wouldn’t wish fame on my worst enemy.”

Natalie Wynn (1988) YouTube personality

ContraPoints Talks Twitter, TERFs, and Tasting the 'Ideal Beer' https://oct.co/essays/natalie-wynn-contrapoints-interview, Interview for October, November 11, 2020 Interviews

People, Communication

“I’ve always believed that the real measure of celebrity success is not just how famous he becomes, but what he does with that fame and fortune.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

“No man is greater than his will;
No gods to him will lend a hand!
Upon his courage and his skill
The record of his life must stand.
What honors shall befall to him,
What he shall claim of fame or pelf,
Depend not on the favoring whim
Of fortune's god, but on himself.”

Edgar Guest (1881–1959) American writer

Source: Just Folks (1917), There Are No Gods, final stanza.

God, Dependency, Courage, Life

“Seem like the more fame, I only got wilder
Hands up, we just doing what the cops taught us
I've been outta my mind a long time
I've been outta my mind a long time
I be saying how I feel at the wrong time
Might not come when you want but I'm on time. Name one genius that ain't crazy.”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Feedback
Lyrics, The Life of Pablo (2016)

Time, Feeling

Theodor W. Adorno (1903–1969) German sociologist, philosopher and musicologist known for his critical theory of society

Their applause, cued in by a light-signal, is transmitted directly on the popular radio programmes they are permitted to attend. They call themselves 'jitter-bugs', bugs which carry out reflex movements, performers of their own ecstasy. Merely to be carried away by anything at all, to have something of their own, compensates for their impoverished and barren existence. The gesture of adolescence, which raves for this or that on one day with the ever-present possibility of damning it as idiocy on the next, is now socialized.
Perennial fashion — Jazz, as quoted in The Sociology of Rock (1978) by Simon Frith, ISBN 0094602204

Star, Sense