Quote collection

Thinking Quotes — page 622 of 4756

Leo Tolstoy Novelist, Philosopher
Peaceful

“And you know, there's less charm in life when you think about death--but it's more peaceful.”

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Ken Russell Film Director
Melancholic

“Films are hard to make and I think the word indulge really leads one to believe that it's an easy sort of business and it's really extremely difficult.”

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James Johnson Poet, Author
Angry

“Mr. Chairman, I think the record should show that for the first time since McKinley, we have a Republican president worth shooting, and I think that's a good sign.”

George R. R. Martin Novelist, Screenwriter
Wise

“Sometimes I think some of my fellow novelists who have not worked in television and film are very naive about this process. They get an offer and there's the dump truck full of money and they sign it, they cash the check and then they're not involved in the series. They may get invited to the premiere and they come out of the premiere looking like all of their children had just been gassed, with a stunned look on their face because everything has been changed.”

George R. R. Martin Novelist, Screenwriter
Courageous

“His sister liked to think of herself as Lord Tywin with teats, but she was wrong. Their father had been as relentless and implacable as a glacier, where Cercei was all wildfire, especially when thwarted.”

George Sand Novelist, Memoirist
Nostalgic

“I loved [fairy stories] so, and my mother weighed down by grief had given up telling me them. At Nohant I found Mmes. d'Ardony's and Perrault's tales in old editions which became my chief joy for five or six years ... I've never read them since, but I could tell each tale straight through, and I don't think anything in all one's intellecutal life can be compared to these delights of imagination.”

George Washington Military Leader, Politician
Wise

“The thinking part of mankind do not form their judgment from events; and their equity will ever attach equal glory to those actions which deserve success, and those which have been crowned with it.”

Gilbert K. Chesterton Writer, Journalist
Grateful

“My brother, Cecil Edward Chesterton, was born when I was about five years old; and, after a brief pause, began to argue. He continued to argue to the end. I am glad to think that through all those years we never stopped arguing; and we never once quarreled. Perhaps the principal objection to a quarrel is that it interrupts an argument.”

Gilbert K. Chesterton Writer, Journalist
Philosophical

“Civilization has run on ahead of the soul of man, and is producing faster than he can think and give thanks.”

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Gilbert K. Chesterton Writer, Journalist
Funny

“At any innocent tea-table we may easily hear a man say, "Life is not worth living." We regard it as we regard the statement that it is a fine day; nobody thinks that it can possibly have any serious effect on the man or on the world. And yet if that utterance were really believed, the world would stand on its head.”

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Gilbert K. Chesterton Writer, Journalist
Philosophical

“...But nature does not say that cats are more valuable than mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not even say that the cat is enviable or the mouse pitiable. We think the cat superior because we have (or most of us have) a particular philosophy to the effect that life is better than death. But if the mouse were a German pessimist mouse, he might not think that the cat had beaten him at all. He might think he had beaten the cat by getting to the grave first.”

Gore Vidal Writer, Essayist, Playwright
Courageous

“How to get people to vote against their interests and to really think against their interests is very clever. It's the cleverest ruling class that I have ever come across in history. It's been two hundred years at it. It's superb.”

Gore Vidal Writer, Essayist, Playwright
Creative

“I find in most novels no imagination at all. They seem to think the highest form of the novel is to write about marriage, because that's the most important thing there is for middle-class people.”

Graham Joyce Author
Spiritual

“I have to get out once a week and speak with people or I start thinking I'm the emperor of Abyssinia.”

Graham Swift Author
Calm

“I do my thinking while I walk. It just loosens up the mind in the way that you don't get when you are sitting at a desk.”

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Greil Marcus Music Critic
Grateful

“I never find myself even catching lyrics until something in the sound has taken me captive. Thinking about anything else is just the pleasurable byproduct of wow.”

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Groucho Marx Actor, Comedian, Writer
Funny

“I think that the Peeps or Peppies or Pipes diaries would be much more popular had there been a universal pronuncation of his name.”