Fran Lebowitz famous quotes

Very few people possess true artistic ability. It is therefore both unseemly and unproductive to irritate the situation by making an effort. If you have a burning, restless urge to write or paint, simply eat something sweet and the feeling will pass.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Sweet #Art #Writing

Whenever someone accuses someone of being a racist - which is rare, you have to admit, considering how much racism there is - there is an incredible outrage. I realized that we live in an environment that it seems to be worse to call someone a racist than to be one.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Racism #Racist #Environment

I place a high moral value on the way people behave. I find it repellent to have a lot, and to behave with anything other than courtesy in the old sense of the word - politeness of the heart, a gentleness of the spirit.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Heart #People #House

Most writers write too much. I have the exact opposite problem. I feel I could write almost anything in a paragraph. I have a natural ability to condense, and so I often think, "Are you kidding me? Five thousand words? How am I gonna make 5,000 words out of that?"
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Writing #Thinking #Opposites

In real life, I assure you, there is no such thing as algebra.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Real #Mathematics

In a print interview, as you may or may not know, they [editors] can do whatever they want. And they do. This is why most people are more hesitant to do print, because they can change it, and they do change it. They even change things that are in quotation marks, which is a pet peeve of mine. I've said to numerous reporters, "Would you read me back my direct quotes?" And they always say no. They always say that's against the policy.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Editors #People #Pet

Think before you speak. Read before you think.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Wisdom #Reading

There's too much democracy in the culture, not enough in the society.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Democracy #Culture #Too Much

My favorite animal is steak.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Life #Food #Animal

Even if people aren't Republicans, it doesn't seem shocking to them that Ronald Reagan was the president. Well of course, because Arnold Schwarzenegger was the governor! This is not only a bar too low, this is no bar at all. I don't care who you are, you know 20 people smarter than Ronald Reagan. You know 20 people who would be a better president than Ronald Reagan.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#People #President #Would Be

The opposite of talking isn't listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Hope #Memorable

I'm not a Communist. I'm an American. I'm a capitalist. I mean, I'm not a very good capitalist, myself. I'm not very good at it, but it's not that I'm not for capitalism. But people who believe in things like corporate citizenship, it's idiotic. I mean, it shows you're an idiot.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Believe #Mean #People

Original thought is like original sin: both happened before you were born to people you could not have possibly met.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Women #People #Original Thought

There's also the idea in this country [USA], it's not wholly new, but it's new in its kind of purity, in that you have to be really smart to be really rich. I always say to people, the reason people believe this is a) they've never met a really smart person, and b) they've never met a really rich person. I have met both, and I cannot see the crossover. You do not have to be a genius to get rich. You have to be ruthless to get rich.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Country #Smart #Believe

If you are a dog and your owner suggests that you wear a sweater suggest that he wear a tail.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Dog #Silly #Animal

I used to rent a house in Princeton, New Jersey, and whenever people came to visit me, I would drive them past Albert Einstein's house, which is the most ordinary house in Princeton - a house, let me assure you, that now a salesman wouldn't live in. I'd always say, "That was Albert Einstein's house." And they'd say, "What do you mean? Why would Albert Einstein live in a little house like that?" And I'd always say to people, "Because he didn't care!"
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Mean #Past #People

Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Life #Children #Humorous

Albert Einstein didn't care where he lived. Albert Einstein was a genius. Albert Einstein wasn't getting lost in the master bedroom, he was lost in thought.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Genius #Care #Getting Lost

I wouldn't say that I dislike the young. I'm simply not a fan of naïveté.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Fans #Vets #Young

We live in a culture where everyone is perfectly willing to do this [to make a lot of money], and they're just looking for the opportunity. Obviously, a person who is really dumb is not gonna make a zillion dollars. But for a person who is really smart, really smart, it's a boring pursuit. It's not endlessly fascinating.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Smart #Opportunity #Dumb

I never took hallucinogenic drugs because I never wanted my consciousness expanded one unnecessary iota.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Drug #Unnecessary #Consciousness

Nothing lasts. So it's my belief, yes, I know a lot of the things that we liked didn't last, but maybe things we don't like, they're also not going to last. There has been progress in my lifetime. There are certainly things that are better than when I was young, and there are things that are worse. New York City, it's worse. There's no question.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#New York #Cities #Progress

It is imperative when flying coach that you restrain any tendency toward the vividly imaginative. For although it may momentarily appear to be the case, it is not at all likely that the cabin is entirely inhabited by crying babies smoking inexpensive domestic cigars.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Baby #Smoking #Flying

The first step in having any successful war is getting people to fight it.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#War #Fighting #Successful

You're only as good as your last haircut.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Funny #Witty #Humorous

I never met anyone who didn't have a very smart child. What happens to these children, you wonder, when they reach adulthood?
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Life #Children #Smart

One of the big mistakes they made in Europe is that the circumstances in which you most frequently read or hear the word "race" or "racism" in Europe applies to Muslims. Which is not a race. It is a religion. You can convert to this. You cannot convert your race. I could become a Muslim. I could not become a Chinese person or a black person. So they constantly use that in Europe.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Mistake #Race #Europe

Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Wine #Average #Ideas

All of television's appalling, but this is hardly a new statement.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Television

The telephone is a good way to talk to people without having to offer them a drink.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Humorous #Drinking #Memorable

In fact, we live in a culture where intelligence, exceptional or not, is reviled.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Culture #Facts #Exceptional

Contrary to popular opinion, the hustle is not a new dance step - it is an old business procedure.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Dance #Hustle #Literature

I don't like the kind of country living where you have to help. I like country living where there is help.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Country #Helping #Kind

Life is something to do when you can't get to sleep.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Funny #Life #Happiness

Commercials and sometimes other guests - it's the down side of TV. Other people - it's the downside of life in general.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#People #Guests #Sides

If you removed all of the homosexuals and homosexual influence from what is generally regarded as American culture, you would pretty much be left with Let's Make a Deal.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Culture #Influence #Homosexual

There are some short essays that are very grave, and most contemporary novels are lighter than air.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Air #Graves #Novel

Even when freshly washed and relieved of all obvious confections, children tend to be sticky.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Mom #Baby #Children

Life was certainly more entertaining when people were indulging their vices as opposed to going to meetings to indulge in a new vice: discussing their innermost thoughts in public.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#People #Vices #Entertaining

Designer clothes worn by children are like snowsuits worn by adults. Few can carry it off successfully.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Children #Clothes #Adults

I never wanted to have any extra money, if it meant having to have any extra work.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Extra Work #Wanted #Extras

To put it rather bluntly, I am not the type who wants to go back to the land; I am the type who wants to go back to the hotel.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Witty #Nature #Travel

Life is so absurd now that it is almost impossible to be a satirist in this era.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Eras #Impossible #Life Is

When you leave New York, you are astonished at how clean the rest of the world is. Clean is not enough.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Funny #Travel #New York

I have a hard time writing. Most writers have a hard time writing. I have a harder time than most because I'm lazier than most. I don't want to brag, but I'm the laziest person I have ever known.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Writing #Hard Times #Want

As a teenager you are at the last stage in your life when you will be happy to hear that the phone is for you.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Motivational #Happiness

People elect the President for reasons that have nothing to do with his ability to be president.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#People #President #Reason

Never relinquish clothing to a hotel valet without first specifically telling him that you want it back.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Literature #Want #Firsts

New York was always more expensive than the other places, even when it was going bankrupt. In other words, in 1971, New York was expensive for someone with no money. For anyone.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#New York #No Money

My desire to curtail undue freedom of speech extends only to such public areas as restaurants, airports, streets, hotel lobbies, parks, and department stores. Verbal exchanges between consenting adults in private are as of little interest to me as they probably are to them.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Airports #Freedom Of Speech #Desire

My favorite way to wake up is to have a certain French movie star whisper to me softly at two-thirty in the afternoon that if I want to get to Sweden in time to pick up my Nobel Prize for Literature, I had better ring for breakfast. This occurs rather less often than one might wish.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Stars #Two #Wish

Being offended is a natural consequence of leaving the house.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#House #Leaving #Natural

Now the culture is made of old things, it's a collage. Art made out of art is not art. You're supposed to make art out of life.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Art #Old Things #Culture

Violet will be a good color for hair at just about the same time that brunette becomes a good color for flowers.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Teenage #Flower #Hair

Magazines all too frequently lead to books and should be regarded by the prudent as the heavy petting of literature.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Book #Magazines #Literature

I must take issue with the term 'a mere child,' for it has been my invariable experience that the company of a mere child is infinitely preferable to that of a mere adult.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Children #Issues

Children ask better questions than adults. "May I have a cookie?" "Why is the sky blue?" and "What does a cow say?" are far more likely to elicit a cheerful response than "Where's your manuscript?" "Why haven't you called?" and "Who's your lawyer?"
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Children #Blue #Sky

Your responsibility as a parent is not as great as you might imagine. You need not supply the world with the next conqueror of disease or major motion picture star. If your child simply grows up to be someone who does not use the word "collectible" as a noun, you can consider yourself an unqualified success.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Stars #Children #Growing Up

Sleep is death without the responsibility.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Sleep #Responsibility

Large, naked, raw carrots are acceptable as food only to those who live in hutches eagerly awaiting Easter.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Easter #Vegetables #Naked

Polite conversation is rarely either.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Funny #Witty

All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact, barely presentable.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Beauty #Beautiful #God

I hate writing. I will do anything to avoid it. The only way I could write less was if I was dead.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Hate #Writing #Way

If you read a lot, nothing is as great as you've imagined. Venice is - Venice is better.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Venice

Children are the most desirable opponents at scrabble as they are both easy to beat and fun to cheat.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Funny #Cheating #Children

Vegetables are interesting but lack a sense of purpose when unaccompanied by a good cut of meat.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Food #Cutting #Vegetables

Your life story would not make a good book. Don't even try.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Book #Writing #Trying

What's the point of being young if you're not going to make new things, I wonder?
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Wonder #Young

If you're going to America, bring your own food.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Travel #Women #Food

If food did not exist it would be well-nigh impossible to get certain types off the phone, as one would be unable to say, 'Look, I've got to run but let's have dinner sometime soon.'
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Running #Phones #Would Be

Civilised adults do not take apple juice with dinner.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Food #Apples #Dinner

Calling a taxi in Texas is like calling a rabbi in Iraq.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Funny #Travel #Texas

If you feel the urge to write, just lie down and read a book: it will pass.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Lying #Book #Writing

Breakfast cereals that come in the same colors as polyester leisure suits make oversleeping a virtue.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Cereal #Color #Breakfast

The best fame is a writer's fame. It's enough to get a table at a good restaurant, but not enough to get you interrupted when you eat.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Writing #Tables #Fame

In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country, capitalism triumphed over democracy.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Country #Democracy #Literature

No animal should ever jump up on the dining-room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Dog #Animal #Pet

If you are truly serious abut preparing your child for the future, don't teach him to subtract teach him to deduct.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Children #Literature #Serious

Food is an important part of a balanced diet.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Funny #Life #Witty

Humility is no substitute for a good personality.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Inspirational #Humility #Personality

When I fly, I'm never afraid the plane is going to crash. But there have often been times when I was afraid it wouldn't crash. I was just afraid it was going to circle O'Hare for the rest of my life.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Circles #Modern Life #Crash

A woman's quest in life should be to find the perfect apartment. And I have found the perfect apartment. The perfect apartment is the first floor of the Metropolitan Museum. With a sofa.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Museums #Perfect #Modern Life

It is not true that there is dignity in all work. Some jobs are definitely better than others.... People who have good jobs are happy, rich, and well dressed. People who have bad jobs are unhappy, poor and use meat extenders. Those who seek dignity in the type of work that compels them to help hamburgers are certain to be disappointed.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Jobs #People #Unhappy

...I believed passionately that Communists were a race of horned men who divided their time equally between the burning of Nancy Drew books and the devising of a plan of nuclear attack that would land the largest and most lethal bomb squarely upon the third-grade class of Thomas Jefferson School in Morristown, New Jersey.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#War #Book #School

Citizen's Band radio renders one accessible to a wide variety of people from all walks of life. It should not be forgotten that all walks of life include conceptual artists, dry cleaners, and living poets.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#Artist #People #Citizens

One [New York] eatery is a remodeled diner that looks like what Busby Berkeley would have done if only he hadn't had the money.
-- Fran Lebowitz

#New York #Looks #Done