Quotes about uncle (181 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“They asked him for help rebuilding the farm, but e only shook his head with a pang of longing in his heart.
I'm tracking your killers", he whispered to his uncle.”

Christopher Paolini book Eragon

Source: Eragon

Help , Heart

“Folk caught up in a riot aren't our cousins and sisters, our brothers and uncles. They are part of a big animal with many arms and claws, armed with stones and sticks.”

Tamora Pierce book Terrier

Source: Terrier

Sister , Animals , Parting

“I have looked upon all that the universe has to hold of horror, and even the skies of spring and the flowers of summer must ever afterward be poison to me. But I do not think my life will be long. As my uncle went, as poor Johansen went, so I shall go. I know too much, and the cult still lives.”

H.P. Lovecraft book The Call of Cthulhu

Source: Fiction, The Call of Cthulhu (1926)

Life , Spring , Flowers , Thinking

“In the thirty-three years he was in the Marine Corps, Col. Conroy concentrated on the task of defending his country and he did so, exceedingly well. In the next twenty-four years left to him, he put all his efforts into the art of being a terrific father, a loving uncle, a brother of great substance, a beloved grandfather, and a friend to thousands. Out of uniform, the Colonel let his genius for humor flourish. Always in motion he made his rounds in Atlanta each day and no one besides himself knew how many stops he put in during a given day. He was like a bee going from flower to flower, pollinating his world with his generous gift for friendships.”

Pat Conroy (1945–2016) American novelist

Letter to his readers (1998)

Love , Friendship , World , Art

“We need to expand the civil-rights struggle to a higher level—to the level of human rights. Whenever you are in a civil-rights struggle, whether you know it or not, you are confining yourself to the jurisdiction of Uncle Sam. No one from the outside world can speak out in your behalf as long as your struggle is a civil-rights struggle. Civil rights comes within the domestic affairs of this country.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (April 3, 1964)
Context: We need to expand the civil-rights struggle to a higher level—to the level of human rights. Whenever you are in a civil-rights struggle, whether you know it or not, you are confining yourself to the jurisdiction of Uncle Sam. No one from the outside world can speak out in your behalf as long as your struggle is a civil-rights struggle. Civil rights comes within the domestic affairs of this country. All of our African brothers and our Asian brothers and our Latin-American brothers cannot open their mouths and interfere in the domestic affairs of the United States. And as long as it’s civil rights, this comes under the jurisdiction of Uncle Sam. But the United Nations has what’s known as the charter of human rights; it has a committee that deals in human rights. You may wonder why all of the atrocities that have been committed in Africa and in Hungary and in Asia, and in Latin America are brought before the UN, and the Negro problem is never brought before the UN. This is part of the conspiracy. This old, tricky blue eyed liberal who is supposed to be your and my friend, supposed to be in our corner, supposed to be subsidizing our struggle, and supposed to be acting in the capacity of an adviser, never tells you anything about human rights. They keep you wrapped up in civil rights. And you spend so much time barking up the civil-rights tree, you don’t even know there’s a human-rights tree on the same floor.

World , Country

“England is not the jewelled isle of Shakespeare’s much-quoted message, nor is it the inferno depicted by Dr Goebbels. More than either it resembles a family, a rather stuffy Victorian family, with not many black sheep in it but with all its cupboards bursting with skeletons. It has rich relations who have to be kow-towed to and poor relations who are horribly sat upon, and there is a deep conspiracy of silence about the source of the family income. It is a family in which the young are generally thwarted and most of the power is in the hands of irresponsible uncles and bedridden aunts. Still, it is a family. It has its private language and its common memories, and at the approach of an enemy it closes its ranks. A family with the wrong members in control — that, perhaps, is as near as one can come to describing England in a phrase.”

George Orwell book England Your England

Part I : England Your England, § III
The Lion and the Unicorn (1941)

Family , Silence , Memory , Relation ships

“I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy
eyes—and moreover, I will go with thee to thy uncle’s.”

William Shakespeare book Much Ado About Nothing

Source: Much Ado About Nothing

Heart

“If you're black, you got to look at America a little bit different. You got to look at America like the uncle who paid for you to go to college, but who molested you.”

Chris Rock (1965) American comedian, actor, screenwriter, television producer, film producer, and director

“Since I learned the truth in Mecca, my dearest friends have come to include all kinds — some Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, agnostics, and even atheists! I have friends who are called capitalists, Socialists, and Communists! Some of my friends are moderates, conservatives, extremists — some are even Uncle Toms! My friends today are black, brown, red, yellow, and white!”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

Source: The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965), p. 375

Truth , Learning

“My uncle, it seems, had quickly instituted a prodigiously far-flung body of inquires amongst nearly all the friends whom he could question without impertinence, asking for nightly reports of their dreams, and the dates of any notable visions for some time past. The reception of his request seems to have varied; but he must, at the very least, have received more responses than any ordinary man could have handled without a secretary.”

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

Fiction, The Call of Cthulhu (1926)

Dreams , Question , Time , Past

“I think yet again of my father, who struggled to become a painter after he was forced into early and unwelcome retirement by the Great Depression. He has reason to be optimistic about his new career, since the early stages of his pictures, whether still or portraits or landscapes, were full of pow. Mother, meaning to be helpful, would say of each one: "That's really wonderful, Kurt. Now all you have to do is finish it." He would then ruin it. I remember a portrait he did of his only brother, Alex, who was an insurance salesman, which he called "Special Agent". When he roughed it in, his hand and eye conspired with a few bold strokes to capture several important truths about Alex, including a hint of disappointment. Uncle Alex was a proud graduate of Harvard, who would rather have been a scholar of literature than an insurance man.
When Father finished the portrait, made sure every square inch of masonite had its share of paint, Uncle Alex had disappeared entirely. We had a drunk and lustful Queen Victoria instead. This was terrible.”

Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) American writer

Fates Worse than Death (1991)

Truth , Disappointment , Literature , Thinking

“Well, good-by, Uncle Tom; keep a stiff upper lip.”

Harriet Beecher Stowe book Uncle Tom's Cabin

Ch 10 The Property Is Carried Off
Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)

“And now I want to tell you about my late Uncle Alex. He was my father’s kid brother, a childless graduate of Harvard who was an honest life insurance salesman in Indianapolis. He was well-read and wise. And his principal complaint about other human beings was that they so seldom noticed it when they were happy. So when we were drinking lemonade under an apple tree in the summer, say, and talking lazily about this and that, almost buzzing like honeybees, Uncle Alex would suddenly interrupt the agreeable blather to exclaim, If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is. So I do the same now, and so do my kids and grandkids. And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.”

Kurt Vonnegut book A Man Without a Country

A Man Without a Country (2005)

Life , Drink , Thinking , Tree

“Any time Uncle Sam, with all his machinery for warfare, is held to a draw by some rice eaters, he’s lost the battle. He had to sign a truce. America’s not supposed to sign a truce. She’s supposed to be bad. But she’s not bad any more. She’s bad as long as she can use her hydrogen bomb, but she can’t use hers for fear Russia might use hers. Russia can’t use hers, for fear that Sam might use his. So, both of them are weapon-less. They can’t use the weapon because each’s weapon nullifies the other’s. So the only place where action can take place is on the ground. And the white man can’t win another war fighting on the ground. Those days are over. The black man knows it, the brown man knows it, the red man knows it, and the yellow man knows it. So they engage him in guerrilla warfare. That’s not his style. You’ve got to have heart to be a guerrilla warrior, and he hasn’t got any heart.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (April 3, 1964)

War , Fear , Time , Heart

“So our next move is to take the entire civil rights struggle problems into the United Nations, and let the world see that Uncle Sam is guilty of violating the human rights of 22 million Afro-Americans…
Uncle Sam... and still has the audacity or the nerve to stand up and represent himself as the leader of the free world. Not only is he a crook, he’s a hypocrite. Here he is standing up in front of other people, Uncle Sam, with the blood of your and my mothers and fathers on his hands, with the blood dripping down his jaws like a bloody-jawed wolf, and still got the nerve to point his finger at other countries. You can’t even get civil rights legislation. And this man has got the nerve to stand up and talk about South Africa, or talk about Nazi Germany, or talk about Deutschland.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Detroit, Michigan (12 April 1964)

People , World , Problem , Wolf

“When this country here was first being founded there were 13 colonies. The whites were colonized. They were fed up with this taxation without representation, so some of them stood up and said “Liberty or death.” Though I went to a white school over here in Mason, Michigan, the white man made the mistake of letting me read his history books. He made the mistake of teaching me that Patrick Henry was a patriot, and George Washington -- wasn’t nothing nonviolent about old Pat or George Washington. “Liberty or death” was what brought about the freedom of whites in this country from the English. They didn’t care about the odds. Why they faced the wrath of the entire British Empire. And in those days they used to say that the British Empire was so vast and so powerful when the sun would never set on them. This is how big it was, yet these 13 little, scrawny states, tired of taxation without representation, tired of being exploited and oppressed and degraded, told that big British Empire “Liberty or death.” And here you have 22 million Afro-American black people today catching more hell than Patrick Henry ever saw. And I’m here to tell you, in case you don’t know it, that you got a new generation of black people in this country who don’t care anything whatsoever about odds. They don’t want to hear you old Uncle Tom handkerchief heads talking about the odds. No. This is a new generation. If they’re gonna draft these young black men and send them over to Korea or South Vietnam to face 800 million Chinese — if you’re not afraid of those odds, you shouldn’t be afraid of these odds.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Detroit, Michigan (12 April 1964)

Death , Men , People , Books

“Where is home? I've wondered where home is, and I realized, it's not Mars or someplace like that, it's Indianapolis when I was nine years old. I had a brother and a sister, a cat and a dog, and a mother and a father and uncles and aunts. And there's no way I can get there again.”

Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) American writer

As quoted in "The World according to Kurt" http://web.archive.org/web/20051018012956/http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20051011.wxvonnegut11/BNStory/Entertainment/ in Globe and Mail [Toronto] (11 October 2005)
Various interviews

Dogs , Way , Home , Cats

“When you take your case to Washington, D. C., you’re taking it to the criminal who’s responsible; it’s like running from the wolf to the fox. They’re all in cahoots together. They all work political chicanery and make you look like a chump before the eyes of the world. Here you are walking around in America, getting ready to be drafted and sent abroad, like a tin soldier, and when you get over there, people ask you what are you fighting for, and you have to stick your tongue in your cheek. No, take Uncle Sam to court, take him before the world.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (April 3, 1964)

People , World , Wolf , Fight

“I think I have a good deal of my Uncle Theodore in me, because I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside and simply look on.”

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States

As quoted in The Three Roosevelts: Patrician Leaders Who Transformed America (2002) by James MacGregor Burns ad Susan Dunn, p. 563
Variant: I could not at any age be content to take my place in a corner by the fireside and simply look on.

Age , Thinking

“What I now heard so graphically at first-hand, though it was really no more than a detailed confirmation of what my uncle had written, excited me afresh; for I felt sure that I was on the track of a very real, very secret, and very ancient religion whose discovery would make me an anthropologist of note. My attitude was still one of absolute materialism, as l wish it still were, and I discounted with almost inexplicable perversity the coincidence of the dream notes and odd cuttings collected by Professor Angell.”

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

Fiction, The Call of Cthulhu (1926)

Secret , Religion , Dreams , Angels

“I love food! I wake up in the morning and one of the first things on my mind is food, what are we going to eat for lunch? … In Italy… I like the sense of family that you have, the long summertime lunches with uncles who give you advice, the limoncello at the end of meals… Family means to help each other through difficult times, give each other a hand, as in a community. … I admire vegans… I like to eat fish once in while, but I don’t eat meat anymore because animal farms are one of the main causes of the destruction of the planet.”

Willem Dafoe (1955) American actor

"Food Talks: Willem Dafoe, His Italian Family, Broccoli, Carciofi & Panzanella" http://www.foodiamo.com/italian-food-news/food-talks-willem-dafoe/, interview with Foodiamo (January 2018).

Love , Family , Food , Communication

“America’s conscience is bankrupt. She lost all conscience a long time ago. Uncle Sam has no conscience. They don’t know what morals are. They don’t try and eliminate an evil because it’s evil, or because it’s illegal, or because it’s immoral; they eliminate it only when it threatens their existence. So you’re wasting your time appealing to the moral conscience of a bankrupt man like Uncle Sam.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (April 3, 1964)
Context: Don’t change the white man’s mind—you can’t change his mind, and that whole thing about appealing to the moral conscience of America—America’s conscience is bankrupt. She lost all conscience a long time ago. Uncle Sam has no conscience. They don’t know what morals are. They don’t try and eliminate an evil because it’s evil, or because it’s illegal, or because it’s immoral; they eliminate it only when it threatens their existence. So you’re wasting your time appealing to the moral conscience of a bankrupt man like Uncle Sam. If he had a conscience, he’d straighten this thing out with no more pressure being put upon him. So it is not necessary to change the white man’s mind.

Evil , Time

“As long as you’re fighting on the level of civil rights, you’re under Uncle Sam’s jurisdiction. You’re going to his court expecting him to correct the problem. He created the problem. He’s the criminal. You don’t take your case to the criminal; you take your criminal to court.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Detroit, Michigan (12 April 1964)
Context: So those of us whose political, and economic, and social philosophy is black nationalism have become involved in the civil rights struggle. We have injected ourselves into the civil rights struggle, and we intend to expand it from the level of civil rights to the level of human rights. As long as you’re fighting on the level of civil rights, you’re under Uncle Sam’s jurisdiction. You’re going to his court expecting him to correct the problem. He created the problem. He’s the criminal. You don’t take your case to the criminal; you take your criminal to court.

Problem , Fight

“Don't let two men fall in love with you, girls. It's not the sort of thing that ends well."
-Uncle Charles”

Ally Carter (1974) American writer

Source: Uncommon Criminals

Love , Men , Girl

“You are James Herondale, said Uncle Jem. As you always were. Part your mother, part your father, part yourself. I would not change any part of you if I could.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

Source: Nothing but Shadows

Change , Parting

“I'm seventeen and I'm crazy. My uncle says the two always go together. When people ask your age, he said, always say seventeen and insane.”

Ray Bradbury book Fahrenheit 451

Source: Fahrenheit 451

People , Age

“You let their friendship continue because Maisie looks after your son while you're gallivanting around the country disguised as Sherlock Holmes" - Uncle Paton Yewbeam”

Jenny Nimmo (1944) British author of children's books

Source: Charlie Bone and the Shadow

Friendship , Country

“She sees ghosts,” said Samuel, impatient with my whining.

"I see dead people,” I deadpanned back. Oddly, it was Uncle Mike who laughed. I hadn’t thought he’d be a moviegoer.”

Patricia Briggs book Iron Kissed

Source: Iron Kissed

People , Dead

“I came back, Uncle Eddie. Last year, after the Henley, I could have gone to any school in the world -- I could have done anything, but I came back."

"You ran away, Katarina."
"And now I'm back."

"You're still running.”

Ally Carter (1974) American writer

Source: Uncommon Criminals

World , School

“It's good to see you, little one." He (Uncle Eddie) scanned her short skirt. "I only wish I were not seeing quite so much of you.”

Ally Carter book Heist Society

Source: Heist Society

“Sure, this was where her father had planned the De Beers diamond heist when she was three. It was the very room where her uncle had orchestrated the hijacking of eighty percent of the world's caviar when she was seven.”

Ally Carter book Heist Society

Source: Heist Society

World , Beer

“The cheesecake was smooth and lush, with the personality of a warm and well-to-do uncle who knows a hundred dirty jokes and will die of sexual exertions in the arms of his mistress.”

Don DeLillo Underworld

Source: Underworld

Personality

“The sons of York will destroy each other, one brother destroying another, uncles devouring nephews, fathers beheading sons. They are a house which has to have blood, and they will shed their own if they have no other enemy.”

Philippa Gregory book The White Queen

Source: The White Queen

Housing

“I wish everyone would stop crying, Tom. Uncle Joe would be so angry about it." But she's crying herself now. "He'd be so angry at us, Tom, for crying so much when all he did was laugh.”

Melina Marchetta (1965) Australian teen writer

Source: The Piper's Son

Cry

“Out my left, I saw baboon bum, out my right, my long-lost uncle Amos. Naturally, I decided to focus on the right.”

Rick Riordan book The Red Pyramid

Source: The Red Pyramid

Nature

“Actually,” he said, “you’re not far off. Uncle Leo brought some toys for all you good little demigods.”

Rick Riordan book The Blood of Olympus

Source: The Blood of Olympus

“And I will not be beaten by that jackass."

"Jackass?" said Foaly, wounded. "My favorite uncle is a jackass.”

Eoin Colfer (1965) Irish author of children's books

Source: The Atlantis Complex

“Your uncle," Poseidon sighed, "has always had a flair for dramatic exits. I think he would've done well as the god of theater.”

Rick Riordan book The Lightning Thief

Source: The Lightning Thief

God , Thinking

“Long ago, in a burst of friendliness, Aunty and Uncle Jimmy produced a son named Henry…”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Source: To Kill a Mockingbird

“If we can believe in the Gnostic gospel of Thomas, old Uncle Jesus said, "If you bring forth what is inside you, what you bring forth will save you. If you don't bring forth what is inside you, what you bring forth can destroy you.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

Source: Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

“Tavi looked wildly around the courtyard, and when his gaze flicked toward them, his face lit witha ferocious smile. "Uncle Bernard! Uncle Bernard!" he shouted, pointing at Doroga. "He followed me home! Can we keep him?”

Jim Butcher Furies of Calderon

Source: Furies of Calderon

Smile , Home

“Ha!' said the tall man drily. 'He was in high luck. Rich old uncles who die are in shockingly short supply.”

Susanna Clarke book Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

Source: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

“Someday you will know that the heart is not always as wise as it is strong. - Uncle Eddie”

Ally Carter (1974) American writer

Source: Perfect Scoundrels

Strong , Heart

“It was my Uncle George who discovered that alcohol was a food well in advance of modern medical thought.”

P.G. Wodehouse book The Inimitable Jeeves

The Inimitable Jeeves (1923)

Alcohol , Food

“She said you were probably plastic and Uncle Kevin said he’d give you a feel and let her know and then Uncle Joe punched him in the shoulder and said the only thing he’d feel is his A-S-S getting kicked if he tried.”

Shannon Stacey (1972) american writer

Source: Exclusively Yours

Feeling

“My dear children!"
Nellie whopped him upside the head with her backpack.
"Ow!" Uncle Alistair curled over, cupping his hand over his good eye.
"Nellie!" Amy said.
"Sorry," Nellie muttered. "I thought he was one of the bad guys.”

Rick Riordan The Maze of Bones

Source: The Maze of Bones

Children , Guy

“If I couldn't be Eddis, I would be Attolia. If they needed to see my uncle in me, then I would show him to them. And I would take Attolia's advice because if I identified my enemy and destroyed him, Sounis would be safe.”

Megan Whalen Turner book A Conspiracy of Kings

Source: A Conspiracy of Kings

“Sleep every chance you get. Eat every chance you get. Those were two of the many lessons that Kat learned at her father’s knee and her uncle’s table.”

Ally Carter (1974) American writer

Source: Perfect Scoundrels

Sleep , Learning , Chance

“Amy Cahill didn't believe in omens. But black snow was falling, the earth was rumbling beneath her feet, her brother was meowing, and her uncle Alistair was prancing on the beach in pink pajamas.
She had to admit, the signs were not promising.”

Peter Lerangis book The Viper's Nest

Source: The Viper's Nest

“It's healthy to say uncle when your bone's about to break.”

Jonathan Franzen book How to Be Alone

Source: How to Be Alone

“Meltdown when we get home. Mom keeps chocolate for meltdowns. Daddy always has them when Uncle Jonas visits."
-David Lyons from Tanner's Scheme-”

Lora Leigh (1965) American writer

Source: Tanner's Scheme

Home , Moms

“I'm sure Uncle Eddie won't kill him. He'll probably just maim him a little."

"No," Uncle Eddie said. "I won't."

"Okay," Gabrielle said. "So he'll maim him. But Hale can take it.”

Ally Carter (1974) American writer

Source: Perfect Scoundrels

“When uncle Eddie does his impression of 'Like a Virgin' it's like Madonna is coming out of his body!'
Christ what an image.”

Louise Rennison book Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging

Source: Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging

Christ

“I don't want to be rude to the afflicted but Uncle Eddie is bald in a way which is the baldest I have ever seen.”

Louise Rennison (1951–2016) British writer

Source: On the Bright Side, I'm Now the Girlfriend of a Sex God

Way , Affliction

“Sadie got up and kissed Amos on the forehead. “Leave it to us, Uncle. I’ve got a plan.”
“That,” I said, “sounds like very bad news.”

Rick Riordan book The Red Pyramid

Source: The Red Pyramid

Kiss

“And if my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle.”

Tiffanie DeBartolo (1970) American writer

Source: How to Kill a Rock Star

“Bucky: "So I was watching TV today, and there was the most stupidest show on."
Rob: "You don't say. Offended you, did it?"
Bucky: "Yes… Yes. 'Offended.' That's exactly what it did. It said we evolved from monkeys! Well, lemme tell ya something, Bucky Katt don't come from no monkey!"
Rob: "No. No you don't. Cats actually come from a tiny, less developed, rat-like creature."
Bucky: "Wha… Hu… Fe… Shu…"
Satchel: "Ohhhh-ho-ho! Burn! Look out! Cat on fire! Uncle monkey's lookin' pretty good now, eh, Ratboy? Ha Ha Ha!"”

Darby Conley (1970) American cartoonist

Strip October 13, 2004
Daily strip circa 2000
Bucky Katt, Dialogue

Cats

“Saddam gave us a lot of things. The development of the country … but I think what he took away from us in the meantime, was our very souls. We got into a stage where we were fearing each other, where husbands and wives didn't talk to each other, where parents were afraid to express anything in front of their kids because the teachers often asked the kids, 'what does daddy think of uncle Saddam? What does your mummy think of uncle Saddam?.”

Zainab Salbi (1969) Iraqi American author, women's rights activist

And there are horror stories of parents being executed because of the child.
About Human rights in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, as quoted in the documentary I Knew Saddam https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/general/2008/02/2008525183923377591.html (2007) by Al Jazeera English.

Fear , Soul , Thinking , Parent

“Roger: I was super, crazy little! Yeah, like my dad's a guitar player and my uncle was in bands when I was growing up. I sat behind a drum set when I was like six years old. I started taking piano lessons when I was like nine. So, like I've been around music my whole, entire, entire life.”

Roger Manganelli (1973) American musician

Life , Music

“Grover Norquist is a mean-spirited, humorless, dishonest little creep… an embarrassing anomaly, the leering, drunken uncle everyone else wishes would stay home… [He] is repulsive, granted, but there aren't nearly enough of him to start a purge trial.”

Tucker Carlson (1969) American political commentator

Slate magazine, 17 July 1997
Source: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/1997/07/right-wing-journalism-4.html

Home

“When I was a kid back in Kentucky, we went to this church where my uncle preached. It was kind of a weird Baptist, full-on kind of place. People kept running up to the pulpit and grabbing his ankles and being saved. Lots of crying. Even then, at six or seven, I questioned how pure the emotion could be if it were on such display.”

Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician

Quoted in Kevin Sessums, "Johnny Be Good," http://www.johnnydeppfan.com/interviews/vanifair.htm Vanity Fair (February 1997)

People , Question , Cry

“Mel is sensual with me. He treats me like an uncle - a dirty uncle. He's an earthy man and very moral underneath. He has traditional values.”

Madeline Kahn (1942–1999) American actress

Paul D. Zimmerman, (February 17, 1975) "The Mad Mad Mel Brooks", Newsweek

“School failed me, and I failed the school. It bored me. The teachers behaved like Feldwebel (sergeants). I wanted to learn what I wanted to know, but they wanted me to learn for the exam. What I hated most was the competitive system there, and especially sports. Because of this, I wasn't worth anything, and several times they suggested I leave. This was a Catholic School in Munich. I felt that my thirst for knowledge was being strangled by my teachers; grades were their only measurement. How can a teacher understand youth with such a system?... from the age of twelve I began to suspect authority and distrust teachers. I learned mostly at home, first from my uncle and then from a student who came to eat with us once a week. He would give me books on physics and astronomy. The more I read, the more puzzled I was by the order of the universe and the disorder of the human mind, by the scientists who didn't agree on the how, the when, or the why of creation. Then one day this student brought me Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Reading Kant, I began to suspect everything I was taught. I no longer believed in the known God of the Bible, but rather in the mysterious God expressed in nature.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Source: William Hermanns, Einstein and the Poet: In Search of the Cosmic Man (1983), First conversation, p. 8

God , Hate , Books , Youth

“Her uncle drove a taxi which he had purchased on the 'never never' system. You pay $80 down and more than you can afford for the rest of your life.”

Edgar Wallace (1875–1932) British crime writer, journalist and playwright

Novel More Educated Evans (1926) http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/never-never-land.html

Life

“When one speaks of America, millions of Germans think of their relatives who either recently or long ago left their German homeland to seek their fortune in the “New World.” When someone succeeded in quickly making a lot of money in America, people said he had made his fortune. The result was that the “rich uncle” in America was envied and his nephews and nieces were encouraged to join the fortune-seeker. Seeking fortunes in America led to Germany losing people, and the American continent received many people whose contributions are particularly clear in the agricultural and technical fields. That these people and their descendants now give great help to the enemies of Germany in this Second World War is a tragic fact.”

Julius Streicher (1885–1946) German politician

Der Stürmer, 1944

Money , War , People , World

“The next day he [uncle Alfred] took me to hear the 'Concert Colonne' at the Chatelet. First we lunched and then went to the hall. There was a fine program! Schumann, Bizet (new to me), Berlioz (ditto). - I can scarcely express how I marveled at the Hamlet and Romeo et Juliette of Berlioz. - He belongs with Delacroix, with Shakespeare, he is of the same family, he has the mark of these men of genius. He is prodigious in movement, imagination, strangeness, vigor, delicacy, sense of contrast, he is terrible and suave.”

Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) French painter

Quote of Camille Pissarro, Paris, 2 April 1883, in a letter to his son Lucien; from Camille Pissarro - Letters to His Son Lucien ed. John Rewald, with assistance of Lucien Pissarro; from the unpublished French letters; transl. Lionel Abel; Pantheon Books Inc. New York, second edition, 1943, p. 26
1880's

Men , Family , Imagination , Sense

“My mom thinks my new daughter is exceptionally bright, because now she will lie on the floor and talk to the ceiling fan. I said, "Mom, Uncle Harold does that and y'all call him an alcoholic."”

Jeff Foxworthy (1958) American stand-up comedian

You Might Be a Redneck If… (1993)

Alcohol , Lie , Moms , Thinking

“Finally.... I will have finished the paintings for my uncle. I have completely reworked them since my last letter [to his mother, 5 May 1865]; originally I had included a mass of details, which, from the distance they were intended to be viewed, had a very bad effect. I have worked at breakneck speed for two weeks, and now I am rather pleased, at least with one of them.”

Frédéric Bazille (1841–1870) French painter

Quote from Bazille's letter to his mother, c. 18/25 August, 1865; as cited in Impressionnism, Gary Tinterow, Henri Loyrette; Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1994, p. 329
1861 - 1865

Painting , Speed

“All Uncle Larry is saying is that individuals have to accept responsibility for their own bad choices. If every time we choose a turd, society, at great expense, simply allows us to redeem it for a pepperoni, then not only will we never learn to make smart choices, we will also surrender the freedom to choose, because a choice without consequences is no choice at all. Maybe it boils down to the premium we want to place on liberty.”

Tom Robbins Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas

Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (1994)

Freedom , Learning , Time

“Sniviling [sic] worm (…) a Jewish Uncle Tom who would have turned rat on Anne Frank.”

Mark Williams American conservative activist, radio talk show host and author

Attacking Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, for his support of the same mosque.
Source: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/05/25/2010-05-25_tea_party_drip_bags_on_stringer.html#ixzz0oxRMH0QV

“My uncle jumped up from the desk, loving him more than he loved any other man in the world, and through him loving the lost nation, the multitude dead, and the multitude living in every alien corner of the world.”

William Saroyan (1908–1981) American writer

Inhale and Exhale (1936), Antranik and the Spirit of Armenia

Love , World , Dead

“I, born in Essex thirty-four
Essentially sexual years ago,
Stepped down, looked around, and saw
I had been cast a little low
In the social register
For the friends whom I now know.
Is a constable a mister?
Bob's your uncle, even so.”

George Barker (1913–1991) British poet

The True Confession of George Barker

“As a rule, you see, I'm not lugged into Family Rows. On the occasions when Aunt is calling Aunt like mastodons bellowing across primeval swamps and Uncle James's letter about Cousin Mabel's peculiar behaviour is being shot round the family circle ('Please read this carefully and send it on Jane') the clan has a tendency to ignore me. It's one of the advantages I get from being a bachelor - and, according to my nearest and dearest, practically a half-witted bachelor at that.”

P.G. Wodehouse book The Inimitable Jeeves

The Inimitable Jeeves (1923)

Family , Reading

“The DC comics were always a lot more true blue. Very enjoyable, but they were big, brave uncles and aunties who probably insisted on a high standard of you know mental and physical hygiene. Whereas the Stan Lee stuff, the Marvel comics, he went from one dimensional characters whose only characteristic was they dressed up in costumes and did good. Whereas Stan Lee had this huge breakthrough of two-dimensional characters. So, they dress up in costumes and do good, but they've got a bad heart. Or a bad leg. I actually did think for a long while that having a bad leg was an actual character trait.”

Alan Moore (1953) English writer primarily known for his work in comic books

Interview on BBC Radio 4 (27 January 2005) http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=4533

Thinking , Heart

“My current novel, Pallas, is all about that culture war - in fact it's been called the Uncle Tom's Cabin of the Sagebrush Rebellion - and yet what I hear all too often from libertarians is that they don't read fiction.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

"Merchants of Fear" http://www.lneilsmith.org/merchant.html Presented to the Boulder County Libertarian Party, 20 February 1994.

War , Reading

“Ahmud Shah, without waiting to besiege the Hindoo capital, overran the open country; and wherever he went put to death men, women, and children, without mercy, contrary to the compact made between his uncle and predecessor, Mahomed Shah, and the Rays of Beejanuggur. Whenever the number of slain amounted to twenty thousand, he halted three days, and made a festival celebration of the bloody event. He broke down, also, the idolatrous temples, and destroyed the colleges of the bramins. During these operations, a body of five thousand Hindoos, urged by desperation at the destruction of their religious buildings, and at the insults offered to their deities, united in taking an oath to sacrifice their lives in an attempt to kill the King, as the author of all their sufferings…”

Firishta (1560–1620) Indian historian

Sultãn Ahmad Shãh I Walî Bahmanî (AD 1422-1435) Vijayanagar (Karnataka)
Tãrîkh-i-Firishta

Death , Women , Men , Children

“Oh! my name is John Wellington Wells,
I'm a dealer in magic and spells,
In blessings and curses
And ever-filled purses,
In prophecies, witches, and knells.

If you want a proud foe to "make tracks"—
If you'd melt a rich uncle in wax—
You've but to look in
On our resident Djinn,
Number seventy, Simmery Axe!”

W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) English librettist of the Gilbert & Sullivan duo

Mr Wells' song, Act I.
"Simmery Axe" is the traditional pronunciation of "St. Mary Axe", a road in the City of London.
In Gilbert's day, the last building was number 68, though number 70 was built later.
The Sorcerer (1877)

“The Opera House is a splendid edifice, and I wish to take nothing away from it, but my heart belongs to the Harbour Bridge. It's not as festive, but it is far more dominant – you can see it from every corner of the city, creeping into frame from the oddest angles, like an uncle who wants to get into every snapshot. From a distance it has a kind of gallant restraint, majestic but not assertive, but up close it is all might. It soars above you, so high that you could pass a ten-storey building beneath it, and looks like the heaviest thing on earth. Everything that is in it – the stone blocks in its four towers, the latticework of girders, the metal plates, the six-million rivets (with heads like halved apples) – is the biggest of its type you have ever seen. This is a bridge built by people who have had an Industrial Revolution, people with mountains of coal and ovens in which you could melt down a battleship. The arch alone weighs 30,000 tons. This is a great bridge.”

Bill Bryson (1951) American author

Pages 80-81
In a Sunburned Country (US), Down Under (UK) (2000)

People , Mountain , Heart , Housing

“…Suppose you have two free hours a week, and are uncertain whether to use them playing chess or tennis. A good friend might ask: ‘What does your heart tell you?’ ‘Well,’ you answer, ‘as far as my heart is concerned, it’s obvious tennis is better. It’s also better for my cholesterol level and blood pressure. But my fMRI scans indicate I should strengthen my left pre-frontal cortex. In my family dementia is quite common, and my uncle had it at a very early age. The latest studies indicate that a weekly game of chess can help delay its onset.”

Yuval Noah Harari book Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow

Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow

Age , Family , Game , Study

“Our armies swore terribly in Flanders, cried my uncle Toby, — but nothing to this. — For my own part, I could not have a heart to curse my dog so.”

Laurence Sterne book The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

Book III, Ch. 11.
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1760-1767)

Dogs , Heart , Parting

“My dear Theo, Feeling, even a fine feeling, for the beauties of nature isn't the same as religious feeling, although I believe that the two are closely connected. The same is true of a feeling for art. Don't give in to that too much either. Hold fast especially to your love for the firm [of the Paris' art dealers Goupil & C0, where both brothers worked - Vincent started in 1869 and Theo in 1873] and for your work.... Nearly everyone has a feeling for nature, some more than others, but there are few who feel that God is a spirit, and that they must worship Him in spirit and in truth. Pa is one of the few, Ma too, and also Uncle Vincent, I believe.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

quote from his Letter #049 to Theo on 'religious feeling' (Paris, 17 Sept. 1875) http://vangoghletters.org/vg/letters/let049/letter.html
1870s

Love , God , Truth , Beauty

“Nixon’s offences had been so long in the past, so much part of a different era that he now seemed like some lovable but bigoted uncle you tolerated at Christmas and Thanksgiving.”

Jacob M. Appel book The Man Who Wouldn't Stand Up

The Man Who Wouldn't Stand Up (2012)

Past , Christmas , Parting

“Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's wife.”

L. Frank Baum book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

Source: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900), Ch. 1, "The Cyclone"

“The Beatles may be more popular than Jesus but heavy cats like Chairman Mao, Uncle Ho, and beautiful long-haired Che Guevara are more popular than The Beatles.”

Abbie Hoffman book Woodstock Nation

Down on Me and Janis Joplin
Woodstock Nation (1969)

Beauty , Cats

“(mimicking a big fish talking to a little fish)
"Hey - Perch…"
(points at his eyes, then at the imaginary perch's)
"Look at me…"
(thinks, concedes, then points at the sides of his head where a fish's eyes would be)
"Look at me… Both eyes…" - oh, I've thought it all through - "if you ever see a worm… in the shape of a J… swim away. That's how we lost your Uncle Pike."”

Bill Engvall (1957) American comedian and actor

15° Off Cool (2007)

Thinking , Fish

“When I had my own company on Traffic and Coonskin, all metaphors were able to get to the screen clearly. In Cool World, with the producer and Paramount watching me carefully to make sure I was in good taste, I instinctively poured stuff into the picture that I wanted to talk about. But when you force stuff, it's not really very clear. But, I have a great love for Max Fleischer, especially some of his Black & White Betty Boops with their strange Cab Calloway and Louis Armstrong black folk tale jazz hipness that part of Cool World was a homage in style to those films and that style of cartooning. The Grim Reaper is right out of a Max Fleischer cartoon or old Terrytoons, which is why I hired and love Milton Knight the artist. He understands totally the Uncle Remus fable like qualities behind Fleischer and Terrytoons. Milton Knight is probably the purest artist of that style in the business. He has a hard time because studios think he is old fashioned…but that's the point.”

Ralph Bakshi (1938) Animator, filmmaker

[c. 17 September 2004, http://www.wild-things.com/bray/documents/ralphb.doc, Questions for Ralph Bakshi, DOC, Ralph Bakshi Forum, 2007-11-27]

Love , World , Fashion , Understanding

“The family plots are close together in the sparse shade. My father, Ray. My mother, Lorene. Aunt Mildred and Uncle Bob, Docie, Betty, Johnny and Doris Jean. All of them there, all of them at rest. Seeing my father's grave, I smile, remembering something he told me when I was a teenager, conflicted over some long-forgotten crisis. "What do you think you should do about it, Tommy Ray?" He'd asked. "I dunno," I'd said. "It's all so confusing." He looked at me with a gentle smile. "Remember this, son. You don't necessarily need to know anything to have an opinion." Since that day, I've been what you might call opinionated, although as an adult, I like to believe I've earned the opinions I have.”

Tommy Franks (1945) United States Army general

Source: American Soldier (2004), p. 561

Family , Smile , Thinking

“It will only take a minute,” said Uncle Einar’s sweet wife.
“I refuse,” he said. “And that takes but a second.”

Ray Bradbury book R Is for Rocket

Uncle Einar (1947)
R Is for Rocket (1962)

“Look, I learned from your uncle that when the universe turns out to be insane, the wise man embraces insanity.”

Bradley Denton (1958) American science fiction author

Source: Buddy Holly is Alive and Well on Ganymede (1991), pp. 213-214

Learning , Universe

“My show was so personal, I made it feel like you and I were the only ones there. And I’d say: Boys and girls, come here. Uncle Jack wants to tell you something. You go get Mother or Daddy, Grandmother, Grandfather, whoever is in the house. You go get them, and you make sure they exercise with me.”

Jack LaLanne (1914–2011) American exercise instructor

In "Jack LaLanne, Founder of Modern Fitness Movement, Dies at 96, New York Times."

Feeling , Exercises , Girl , Boy

“There're so many young guys, you know — young Americans and, yes, young men everywhere — a whole generation of people younger than me who have grown up feeling inadequate as men because they haven't been able to fight in a war and find out whether they are brave or not. Because it is in an effort to prove this bravery that we fight — in wars or in bars — whereas if a man were truly brave he wouldn't have to be always proving it to himself. So therefore I am forced to consider bravery suspect, and ridiculous, and dangerous. Because if there are enough young men like that who feel strongly enough about it, they can almost bring on a war, even when none of them want it, and are in fact struggling against having one. (And as far as modern war is concerned I am a pacifist. Hell, it isn't even war anymore, as far as that goes. It's an industry, a big business complex.) And it's a ridiculous thing because this bravery myth is something those young men should be able to laugh at. Of course the older men like me, their big brothers, and uncles, and maybe even their fathers, we don't help them any. Even those of us who don't openly brag. Because all the time we are talking about how scared we were in the war, we are implying tacitly that we were brave enough to stay. Whereas in actual fact we stayed because we were afraid of being laughed at, or thrown in jail, or shot, as far as that goes.”

James Jones (1921–1977) American author

The Paris Review interview (1958)

Men , War , People , Guy

“Nigel's six feet sprawled all over the place; his gestures were nervous and little uncouth; a lock of sandy coloured hair dropping over his forehead, and the deceptive naïveté of his face in repose gave him a resemblance to an overgrown prep. schoolboy. His eyes were the same blue as his uncle's, but shortsighted and noncommittal. Yet there was an underlying similarity between the two. A latent, sardonic humor in their conversation, a friendliness and simple generosity in their smiles, and that impression of energy in reserve which is always given by those who possess an abundance of life directed towards consciously-realised aims.”

Cecil Day Lewis (1904–1972) English poet

Thou Shell of Death (1936)

Life , Smile

“oh nothin, i was just buying some ear medication for my sick uncle… *LOWERS SHADES TO LOOK YOU DEAD IN THE EYE* who's a Model by the way”

Dril Twitter user

[ Link to tweet https://twitter.com/dril/status/197502223226384387]
Tweets by year, 2012

Way , Dead

“When Uncle Jake
Became a snake
He never found it out;
And so as no one mentions it
One sees him still about.”

Mervyn Peake (1911–1968) English writer, artist, poet and illustrator

Poem Uncles and aunts

“The very saddest sound in all my memory was burned into my awareness at age five on my uncle's dairy farm in Wisconsin. A cow had given birth to a beautiful male calf. The mother was allowed to nurse her calf but for a single night. On the second day after birth, my uncle took the calf from the mother and placed him in the veal pen in the barn—only ten yards away, in plain view of the mother. The mother cow could see her infant, smell him, hear him, but could not touch him, comfort him, or nurse him. The heartrending bellows that she poured forth—minute after minute, hour after hour, for five long days—were excruciating to listen to. They are the most poignant and painful auditory memories I carry in my brain. Since that age, whenever I hear anyone postulate that animals cannot really feel emotions, I need only to replay that torturous sound in my memory of that mother cow crying her bovine heart out to her infant. Mother's love knows no species barriers, and I believe that all people who are vegans in their hearts and souls know that to be true.”

Michael Klaper (1947) American physician

Quoted in Joanne Stepaniak, The Vegan Sourcebook (Lowell House, 1998), pp. 39-40.

Love , Pain , People , Age

“No day was more difficult for Allah’s Messenger than the Day (Battle) of Uhud in which his uncle Hamza, the lion of Allah and the lion of His Messenger, was killed, and after it was the Day of Mu'tah in which his cousin Ja'far ibn Abi Talib was killed." Then he (Zayn al-Abidin) said: "There was no day like the Day of Husayn, when thirty thousand men advanced against him (while) they claimed that they belonged to this community, and that they (wanted) to seek proximity to Allah, the Great and Almighty, through (shedding) his blood. He (al-Husayn) reminded them of Allah, but they did not learn (from him) till they killed him out of (their) oppression and aggression".”

Ali Zayn al-Abidin (659–713) Great-grandson of the Prophet Muhammad

Majlisi, Bihārul Anwār 22/274, H. 21 and 44/298, H. 4.

Men , Communication , Learning

“My dad A. D. King, Uncle MLK, and Granddaddy King passed on to me their beliefs on biblical marriage. Life is a human and civil right, so is procreative marriage… We must now go back to the beginning, starting with Genesis, and teach about God’s plan for marriage… It's time to start from scratch and lay the foundation all over again.”

Alveda King (1951) American, civil rights activist, Christian minister, conservative, pro-life activist, and author

Human Sexuality: It All Started With An Apple! http://www.priestsforlife.org/library/5154-and-it-all-started-with-an-apple (January 13, 2015)

Life , God , Marriage , Time

“Africa does not have an uncle abroad who will come to bail it out of its political and economic woes. It is important that African countries wake up and pool whatever resources they have and jointly deal elements pulling our continent down a death blow.”

Bernard Membe (1953) Tanzanian politician

Quoted in Austin Beyadi, "Unity will end crises, Membe tells Africa," http://ippmedia.com/ipp/guardian/2008/03/28/111246.html The Guardian (2008-03-28)

Death , Country

“My uncle [mother’s brother] wrote rather twee books of memoirs in the period between the two World Wars. They’d be deeply embarrassing to read today. In the 19th century my mother’s family were involved with the Pre-Raphaelites, and a direct ancestor of mine was Lady Byron’s lawyer, who advised her to leave the poet because of her husband’s affair with his half-sister. A much earlier ancestor on my mother’s side was chaplain to Richard Corbet, Bishop of Oxford, who wrote the poem ‘Farewell Rewards and Fairies’. In his ‘Brief Lives’ Aubrey describes them getting drunk together in the cellars of Christchurch, Oxford.”

Edward Lucie-Smith (1933) British art critic, writer and curator

From an interview http://rimbaud.org.uk/q-lucie-smith.html

War , Books , World , Family

“Jewish people in Canada, Israel and around the world will begin celebrating Purim. I would like to extend my best wishes to the community as you celebrate with some of the happiest traditions of the holiday. Chag Purim Sameach!
Happy Purim! Chag Sameach! This evening, Jewish people in Canada, Israel and around the world will begin celebrating Purim. This delightful holiday tells the story of Queen Esther and her uncle Mordechai, who saved the Jewish community of ancient Persia from their persecutor, Haman. Purim celebrates their heroism and bravery, which led to the survival and victory of the Jewish people. For all Canadians, the story of Purim is a reminder of the freedoms we enjoy and our duty to stand against religious intolerance.
I would like to extend my best wishes to Canada’s Jewish community as you celebrate with some of the happiest traditions of the holiday: the reading of the Book of Esther (Megillat Esther); the exchange of special gift baskets with family and friends (Mishloach Manot); and, of course, eating delicious Hamentashen pastries. Have a fun and festive celebration! Happy Purim! Freilichen Purim!”

Andrew Scheer (1979) 35th Speaker of the Canadian House of Commons and MP for Regina—Qu'Appelle

28 February 2018 tweet https://twitter.com/andrewscheer/status/968965231987830786?lang=en referencing Facebook post https://www.facebook.com/notes/andrew-scheer/happy-purim/1939533102747099/

People , Books , World , Family