Indro Montanelli Quotes

#1. Democracy is always, by nature and constitution, the triumph of mediocrity.

Indro Montanelli

#2. I know many crooks and they never preach, but I don't know anyone who preaches that isn't a crook also.

Indro Montanelli

#3. A real writer [ ... ] looks not in another writer but himself.

Indro Montanelli

#4. An Italian university is a contradiction in terms.

Indro Montanelli

#5. It isn't necessary to be socialists in order to love Pertini. Whatever he says or does, smells of cleanliness, of loyalty and of sincerity.

Indro Montanelli

#6. The only advice that I'm in the mood to give - and that I give regularly - to young people is this: fight for what you believe in. You will lose, just like I have lost, all the battles. But only one you may win. The one that you engage every morning, in front of the mirror.

Indro Montanelli

#7. Depression is a democratic sickness: it afflicts everyone.

Indro Montanelli

#8. Cynics are all moralists, and merciless too.

Indro Montanelli

#9. The nice thing about political pundits is that, when they answer a question, one no longer understands what they were asked.

Indro Montanelli

#10. Also we Italians have something to Elvis Presley: to offer one of the rare occasions when we prefer to be Italian rather than American.

Indro Montanelli

#11. [Addressed to Berlusconi who wanted to impose himself on the editorial style of "Il Giornale"] In the art of entrepeneurship, you are certainly a genius, and I an asshole. But in the art of argument the genius is me, and you the asshole.

Indro Montanelli

#12. Which ever one of you will want to become a journalist, let him remember to choose his own master: the reader.

Indro Montanelli

#13. Men do not know how to appreciate and measure luck except that of others. Their own never.

Indro Montanelli

#14. Servitude, in many cases, is not forced upon by the masters, but a temptation of the servants.

Indro Montanelli

#15. You give Italy Jesus Christ and you get the Roman Catholic Church.

Indro Montanelli

#16. Fascism rewarded jackasses in uniform. Democracy gives priviliges to those in sports' gear. In Italy, political regimes come to pass. The jackasses remain. Triumphant.

Indro Montanelli

#17. Politicians do nothing but ask of us, during every expiration of a legal statute, "a gesture of trust." But here trust is not enough; what's needed is an act of faith.

Indro Montanelli

#18. Italian husbands, in order to buy their wives a fur, spend more than all their European collegues.

Indro Montanelli

#19. The love of power excludes all others.

Indro Montanelli

#20. Pertini has interpreted as their best the worst about Italians.

Indro Montanelli