Commencement Speech Quotes

#1. The commencement speech is not, I think, a wholly satisfactory manifestation of our culture.

John Kenneth Galbraith

#2. Read. Read all the time. Read as a matter of principle, as a matter of self-respect. Read as a nourishing staple of life." (Wellesly High School commencement speech, "You Are Not Special", 6-12)

Teacher David McCullough

#3. If I were asked to give a commencement speech (which I'll never be), I'd say basically: They're all gonna laugh at you. Life is pretty much like Carrie's prom. So ... stay secret.

Mark Leyner

#4. President Bush delivered a commencement speech at a university in Wisconsin. A very inspirational speech. Apparently Bush told the students, 'You can do anything in life if your parents work hard enough.'

Conan O'Brien

#5. George W. Bush gave a commencement speech at Southern Methodist University this weekend. It was pretty inspirational. He said, 'As I like to tell the 'C' students, you too can be president.' Even George W. Bush has George W. Bush comedy material in his act.

Jimmy Fallon

#6. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice.
[Stanford University commencement speech, 2005]

Steve Jobs

#7. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.

J.K. Rowling

#8. President Obama and Mitt Romney both gave commencement speeches over the last few days. Obama was like, 'You can be whatever you want to be,' while Romney was like, 'I can be whatever you want me to be.'

Jimmy Fallon

#9. Live your fear." Why didn't we teach kids that? Why wasn't that in a graduation speech? Commencement speakers should start telling the truth: "You're going to fuck up, but most of the time, that's all right.

Mara Wilson

#10. It's always nice to end your sentences with an exclamation mark, and not a comma.

Joey Santiago

#11. There are many families where the whole interest of life is centered upon the dog.

Jerome K. Jerome

#12. Sometimes you find out what you are supposed to be doing by doing the things you are not supposed to do.

Oprah Winfrey

#13. We are taught to want a thing. We are taught that having that thing will make us happy. We are taught that having it immediately is the answer. We are taught a corrupted version of success. And love.

Daniel Gillies

#14. It's really funny if two women stand on the House floor. There are usually at least two men who go by and say, 'What is this, a coup?' They're almost afraid to see us in public together.

Patricia Schroeder

#15. As far as I can tell, it's just about letting the universe know what you want and then working toward it while letting go of how it comes to pass.

Jim Carrey

#16. We've been helping you out in Alaska in considerable ways, and you're walking away from the responsibility, and we're not going to allow that.

Lisa Murkowski

#17. That dismal prison house within whose dungeons so many young faces put on the wrinkles of age,

Mark Twain

#18. I was set free, because my greatest fear had already been realized, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

J.K. Rowling

#19. Down the road a bit, I would like to write a couple of stand-alone adult novels, especially in the horror genre. I've got lots of things up my sleeve.

James Dashner

#20. It was only Christianity, with resentment against life in its foundations, which made sexuality something impure: it threw filth on the beginning, on the prerequisite of our life

Friedrich Nietzsche

#21. You will never see a U-Haul behind a hearse,

Denzel Washington

#22. In a word, the free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone, gentlemen, that I vote in favor of free trade.

Karl Marx

#23. And remember whatever discipline you're in, whether you're a musician or a photographer, fine artist or a cartoonist, writer, a dancer, a singer, a designer... whatever you do, you have a thing that's unique. You have the ability to make art.

Neil Gaiman