Preferably Quotes

#1. Sturmhond had a way of talking that made me want to shoot someone. Preferably him.

Leigh Bardugo

#2. Spying is a like a game of chess: Sometimes you have to withdraw, sometimes you have to sacrifice one of your pieces to win - preferably a knight rather than a king or queen.

John Rhys-Davies

#3. Writing a story I am just trying to find some little interesting thing to start out with: something small, even trivial. Preferably something that doesn't have a lot of thematic or political baggage - a little crumb that is interesting.

George Saunders

#4. Knowledge is what we get when an observer, preferably a scientifically trained observer, provides us with a copy of reality that we can all recognize.

Christopher Lasch

#5. Preferably, the window should be north facing, as this will give you the most light and the most even light at any given time of day.

James Carren

#6. Every book should begin with attractive endpapers. Preferably in a dark colour: dark red or dark blue, depending on the binding. When you open the book it's like going to the theatre. First you see the curtain. Then it's pulled aside and the show begins.

Cornelia Funke

#7. Deals are my art form. Other people paint beautifully on canvas or write wonderful poetry. I like making deals, preferably big deals. That's how I get my kicks.

Ed Koch

#8. He'd told her how orphaned birds would sometimes accept the most pathetic substitutes for their mothers - a pullover, a hot-water bottle, an armpit, or even a paper airplane - anything rather than nothing, but preferably something that moved.

Julia Gregson

#9. There are three possible scenarios when it comes to your stilettos and sex: (1) You could wear your stilettos without having sex. (2) You could have sex without your stilettos on. And (3) you could have sex with your stilettos on, preferably at my house, and bring a camera.

Michael Makai

#10. Science is not just about seeing, it's about measuring, preferably with something that's not your own eyes, which are inextricably conjoined with the baggage of your brain. That baggage is more often than not a satchel of preconceived ideas, post-conceived notions, and outright bias.

Neil DeGrasse Tyson

#11. I stopped rowing for a moment to glug down some water, but it was warm, tasted of plastic, and failed to refresh. I yearned for an ice-cold drink - preferably one with bubbles and alcohol in it.

Roz Savage

#12. Why the rifle? Everybody knows you can't shoot.
Who were these everybodies and would they like to stand in front of me, preferably within ten feet, so I could discuss this issue in greater detail.

Ilona Andrews

#13. The only real meaning in life can be found in a good man. And maybe Paris. Preferably the two together.

Marilyn Vos Savant

#14. Has a sense of humor. (Preferably warped.) We know who we are

Susan Scott

#15. Take a human desire, preferably one that has been around for a really long time Identify that desire and use modern technology to take out steps.

Evan Williams

#16. Privatisation is presented as being the only alternative to an inefficient, corrupt state. In fact, it is not a choice at all ... it is a mutually profitable business contract between the private company (preferably foreign) and the ruling elite of the Third World

Arundhati Roy

#17. Life must be understood before getting old, most preferably, in youth!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

#18. I believe there's something very salutary in, say, beating up a gay-bashing policeman. Preferably one fights through the courts, through the laws, through education, but if at a neighborhood level violence is necessary, I'm all for violence. It's the only thing Americans understand.

Gore Vidal

#19. Law Number XLIV: Aircraft flight in the 21st century will always be in a westerly direction, preferably supersonic, crossing time zones to provide the additional hours needed to fix the broken electronics.

Norman Ralph Augustine

#20. He could think in italics. Such people need watching.
Preferably from a safe distance.

Terry Pratchett

#21. For a slim, sexy body, it's important to eat protein every day - preferably at every meal. Be sure to ask about the origins of your meat, poultry and seafood. If you can't afford organic, free-range meats, opt for natural poultry, pork, and beef that's raised without antibiotics or hormones.

Suzanne Somers

#22. Just as every girl should have a husband, preferably her own, so every culture must have its state, preferably its own.

Ernest Gellner

#23. They looked like linebackers on a prison football team, whose idea of commincation was to smash into something at full speed, preferably another person.

John Verdon

#24. I love you, Taylor Carmichael Corretti. I love you for better and for worse - preferably worse, by the way." His eyes glittered into hers. "I love a bad girl. Think about it - if I marry you we can spend the rest of our lives shocking people.

Sarah Morgan

#25. I wanted to be a secret agent and an astronaut, preferably at the same time.

David Byrne

#26. The priesthood is not dying, but the clerical state is dead. It needs to be buried, preferably with a Viking funeral in Boston Harbor so nobody can miss the spectacle of its passing.

Eugene Kennedy

#27. Make a promise: now that you have discovered a force that you were not even aware of, tell yourself that from now on you will use this force for the rest of your days. Preferably, also promise to discover another mountain, and set off on another adventure.

Paulo Coelho

#28. I'm never sure how to rank these things, but I will say that it has been a dream of mine ever since I was a kid to play for the Queen of England. Preferably in the throne room.

Joshua Roman

#29. I see little hope for a peaceful world until men are excluded from the realm of foreign policy altogether and all decisions concerning international relations are reserved for women, preferably married ones.

W. H. Auden

#30. Every American child should grow up knowing a second language, preferably English.

Mignon McLaughlin

#31. Angie: "How do I pitch these ideas to her?"
Mira: "From a distance, preferably wearing body armor.

Kristin Hannah

#32. The key is to set realistic customer expectations, and then not to just meet them, but to exceed them - preferably in unexpected and helpful ways.

Richard Branson

#33. Lie on your back and pinch off your nose. Preferably with a diver's nose clip, but your fingers will do. Just make a point to arrange your arm in a way that minimizes its fatigue. Stick a drinking straw in your mouth and breathe. That's it.

Andy Bolton

#34. Why couldn't I just meet a normal guy for a change? Preferably one that didn't love his car more than me, or one that didn't need his five-a-day in the form of blood infusions. Was that too much to ask?

Jayde Scott

#35. It is an intern's job to go for coffee for anyone who asks, preferably delivering it scalding hot and cupped in your bare hands!

Kurt Braunohler

#36. Verily, I do not like them, the merciful who feel blessed in their pity: they are lacking too much in shame. If I must pity, at least I do not want it known; and if I do pity, it is preferably from a distance.

Friedrich Nietzsche

#37. During the meeting in Delhi with Dirac on 12 January 1955, Nehru asked him if he had any recommendations for the future of the new republic of India. After his usual reflective pause, Dirac replied: 'A common language, preferably English. Peace with Pakistan. The metric system.

Graham Farmelo

#38. She wanted to read and talk and laugh and watch television and listen to the radio. She wanted to watch the world around her go by, and make up stories in her head about everything she saw...Like a princess in a carriage, surveying her kingdom, preferably one with a magical forest.

Jami Attenberg

#39. They mention that it's a nonstop flight. Well, I must say I don't care for that sort of thing. Call me old fashioned, but I insist that my flight stop. Preferably at an airport.

George Carlin

#40. Is important that we get still to wait on God. And it is best that we get alone, preferably with our Bible outspread before us. Then if we will we may draw near to God and begin to hear Him speak to us in our hearts.

A.W. Tozer

#41. I see God as a song-and-dance man. If I had my way, he'd be able to carry a tune, too. Preferably, one of mine.

Kevin Kline

#42. Revolution is about the need to re-evolve political, economic and social justice and power back into the hands of the people, preferably through legislation and policies that make human sense. That's what revolution is about. Revolution is not about shootouts.

Bobby Seale

#43. It is important for everyone to keep in close contact and preferably be in physical proximity with their loved ones.

Deepak Chopra

#44. Honestly, I'm living my fantasy. It's being with my family, preferably on a snowy afternoon with a fire going, cuddled up in blankets, playing a game.

Meredith Vieira

#45. My social status leaps after decades of disqualification on grounds of radiation. The doorbell rings and there stands Vanessa Redgrave. 'Marcie,' she begins, and then goes on about social injustice in Namibia, and how we must all build a raft by late afternoon - preferably out of coconut matting.

Morrissey

#46. Live life as it was meant to be lived. Half asleep, preferably.

[...]

She preferred [...] to go to sleep at once, sleep now being one of the very few aspects of existence for which she felt any degree of enthusiasm [...]

Jonathan Coe

#47. The ass of a man is the piston that drives the world, and you have a good one. In my prime, I would have corked it with my thumb and then eaten you alive. Preferably by the pool of Le Meridien in Monte Carlo, with an admiring audience to applaud my frontside and backside efforts.

Stephen King

#48. Happiness is having a cat for "fuzz therapy". Preferably one with trimmed claws.

Matthias Leue

#49. A short story can be packed with meaning and impact, with the concentrated density of a collapsed star, but should preferably also have a kind of elegant simplicity.

Jeffrey Thomas

#50. Find someone you care enough about to help you control your drinking. Preferably yourself.

Robert Black

#51. We have to laugh. Life is hard and the news is often grim - you should be able to turn on NPR's Weekend Edition every week and know that we are going to make you think, make you question - and make you laugh, preferably out loud.

Rachel Martin

#52. Adonis watched her strut away, friend in tow, like a peacock with a stick wedged up its ass. Tessandra Scarlatti. He'd hoped in his absence, she'd fallen off the planet or died. Preferably both.

Em Wolf

#53. Being in a foreign place, preferably for the first time, having seen many things and collected new impressions, and returning to an empty hotel room with an hour or so to blow. That mix often yields fine results.

Stefan Sagmeister

#54. There is no place i'd rather stay especially if it means more of your apple cinnamon pancakes for breakfast. Preferably served in bed by you completely naked, but i'm flexible.

Christina Tetreault

#55. All good that you have done for the humanity, keep it like a secret; do your goodness in the shadow! Let one day others find this secret, preferably long after you have passed away!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

#56. There's really no such thing as the 'voiceless'. There are only the deliberately silenced, or the preferably unheard.

Arundhati Roy

#57. Stigma's power lies in silence. The silence that persists when discussion and action should be taking place. The silence one imposes on another for speaking up on a taboo subject, branding them with a label until they are rendered mute or preferably unheard.

M.B. Dallocchio

#58. It wasn't enough violence for him. He wanted to do damage to something else. Preferably to something with an aquiline Roman profile that said ouch.

Thea Harrison

#59. I'll direct any movie starring a monkey or the Olsen Twins. Preferably both.

Eli Roth

#60. I'm obsessed with vinyasa flow yoga and Pilates. And since I live in Sweden, and we have good seafood, I tend to cook a lot of fish, preferably with oven-roasted veggies and a cauliflower mash.

Frida Gustavsson

#61. The true hero is flawed. The true test of a champion is not whether he can triumph, but whether he can overcome obstacles - preferably of his own making - in order to triumph.

Garth Stein

#62. I personally enjoy theatre, but preferably I do films so that I can reach up to maximum audience. If you want to give a serious message, it will reach out to maximum people through films. But through theatre, you can hardly reach out to about 3,000 audience at a time.

Om Puri

#63. As long ago as 1860 it was the proper thing to be born at home. At present, so I am told, the high gods of medicine have decreed that the first cries of the young shall be uttered upon the anesthetic air of a hospital, preferably a fashionable one.

F Scott Fitzgerald

#64. Ruth Cole was a novelist; novelists are not at their best when they go off half-cocked. She believed that she would prepare what she was going to tell the police - preferably in writing.

John Irving

#65. Kate had never met a person she didn't want to protect, preferably by hacking at the hostile parties with her sword.

Ilona Andrews

#66. The central focus of what we are doing at the Fed is to keep inflation from accelerating - and preferably decelerating.

Alan Greenspan

#67. Bear hunting? Come on up and we'll fix you up, you betcha. Just be sure you bring some hunting buddies with you, preferably fat ones who can't run as fast as you.

Sarah Palin

#68. I've got different ideas of complete happiness. But one is being by myself out in a forest, completely happy. Another is walking with a dog in some nice place. And three is sitting around preferably a fire, but not necessarily, and drinking red wine with friends and telling stories.

Jane Goodall

#69. She reminded Juliet of the parrot the shopkeeper owned. Both the woman and bird belonged in cages, preferably the same cage, so the bird could poop on all that velvet and lace.

Jordan Elizabeth Mierek

#70. I'm dying to do something sci-fi! I would love to be on a spaceship and firing a laser gun! Something like that would be really awesome. Or something with dinosaurs. Or preferably both at once.

Richard Madden

#71. I'd make another night with me worth your while. I like to draw things out, too, preferably in the bedroom when we're both naked and I'm on top of you.

Collette West

#72. I have a fondness for historical fiction, something wondrous like 'Wolf Hall,' but I'll read most anything as long as the story grabs my mind or my heart, and preferably both. You would be hard pressed, however, to find science fiction on my shelves.

Sue Monk Kidd

#73. I left school the day I turned 16, the earliest day I legally could. Determined to follow a life on stage, preferably with some dance connection, I applied for and won a place at the local drama school. I was on my way.

Celia Imrie

#74. Someday my prince will come." He turned a page. "Preferably on my back.

Anonymous

#75. Riches should come as the reward for hard work, preferably by one's forebears

Steven Runciman

#76. Time had come to formulate a reason to abandon the gardens and leave Miss Bower to leech onto some other gentleman, preferably one who had a certain fondness for parasites.

Sarah M. Eden

#77. A foreigner is an individual who is considered either comic or sinister. When the victim of a disaster - preferably natural but sometimes political -the foreigner may also be pitied from a distance for a short period of time.

John Ralston Saul

#78. I want that at my funeral," said Pam. "I want to be carried out on the shoulders of six stalwart young men. Preferably in loincloths.

Leslie Meier

#79. With the advent of 24-hour Sky News, the News Flash has been greatly devalued. Time was, when something unimaginably horrendous had to happen before it was deemed worthy of a News Flash. At least one, preferably two, and ideally all four horsemen of the apocalypse would have to be involved.

Declan Lynch

#80. The company must be paying dividends. Preferably the dividend will have been increasing and have been paid for some time.

Peter Cundill

#81. In order to hold off the Forces of Darkness, you will need a number two pencil and a calendar, preferably one without pictures of kitties on it.

Christopher Moore

#82. The most important thing for workers to understand is that you have to make yourself indispensable. You must make money for your employer or make his life easier, preferably both. Also, you have to learn as much as you can about your chosen endeavor.

Bill O'Reilly

#83. Kissing, said Lesley, ought really to be taught as a school subject, preferably instead of religious studies, which nobody needed.

Kerstin Gier

#84. In order to get the worst possible first impression of Los Angeles one should arrive there by bus, preferably in summer and on a Saturday night.

Christopher Isherwood

#85. Whether greater cybersecurity requires a greater sacrifice of our digital freedoms is an important debate that we should be having, preferably with all the facts in front of us.

Evgeny Morozov

#86. Success nullifies. You then have to do it again, preferably differently

Karl Lagerfeld

#87. When things go wrong, the standard management strategy is to decide who takes the blame. This should be an underling, as far down the chain as possible, but preferably with some visibility so people know management means business.

Jack McDevitt

#88. All I wanted then was for everything to go on as before, so that I could stay deeply asleep, and be no more than a hole in space, not here or anywhere at all, for as long as possible, preferably forever.

Anna Kavan

#89. I love the ending of a movie where two people end up together. Preferably if there's rain and an airport or running or a confession of love.

Taylor Swift

#90. I need to fuck you again. Preferably the second we land in London, but I'm not opposed to doing it after you get finished serving either.

Whitney G.

#91. The price must be less than one half of the former high and preferably at or near its all time low.

Peter Cundill

#92. They tended towards the simple pleasures in life: drinking, whoring and fighting, preferably all three at once.

Ilona Andrews

#93. When I was growing up, the first thing I wanted to be was a cowboy. That lasted till I was about ten. Then I wanted to be a baseball player. Preferably shortstop for the New York Yankees.

Jerry Spinelli

#94. You know," she said, stirring her tea, "the fastest way to get him off your back is to sleep with him. And tell him you love him. Preferably while in bed."
I smirked and the tea almost came out of my nose. "He'd run like he was on fire.

Ilona Andrews

#95. If you want to finish the evening with your usual number of fingers, do any cutting-up, peel-slicing and the like before you have had more than a couple of drinks, preferably before your first.

Kingsley Amis

#96. The best book, like the best speech, will do it all - make us laugh, think, cry and cheer - preferably in that order.

Madeleine Albright

#97. [My guilty pleasure is a] deep, eco-unfriendly, hot bath. Preferably with a glass of champagne and someone sitting on the loo seat gossiping.

Prue Leith

#98. ... I know that if I were mad, after several days of confinement I should take advantage of any lapses in my madness to murder anyone, preferably a doctor, who came near me. At least this would permit me, like the violent, to be confined in solitary. Perhaps they'd leave me alone.

Andre Breton

#99. A children's writer should, ideally, be a dedicated semi-lunatic, a kind of poet with a marvelous idea, who, preferably, when not committing the marvellous idea to paper, does something else of a quite different kind, so as to acquire new and rich experience.

Joan Aiken

#100. Storms, woman," [Kaladin] said. "I don't know what to make of you."
"Preferably not a corpse."
"I'm surprised someone hasn't already done that.

Brandon Sanderson