Top 100 Shaw's Quotes
#1. It is not easy to make the best of both worlds when one of the worlds is preaching a Class War, and the other vigorously practising it.
- Shaw's Preface
George Bernard Shaw
#2. Shaw's plays are the price we pay for Shaw's prefaces.
James Agate
#3. Thierry, you must learn not only when to lift a burden, but when to set it down." He patted Shaw's lax face with his paw. "Otherwise, your back will break under the strain, and everyone who depends on you will be left as sheep without their shepherd. Do you understand?
Hailey Edwards
#4. The author relates George Bernard Shaw's sentiments that polite conversation excludes the only two subjects that matter, religion and politics.
Lyle W. Dorsett
#5. 'Man and Superman,' first performed in 1905, is by common consent one of George Bernard Shaw's greatest and most significant plays, yet hardly anybody performs it today, for the understandable reason that an uncut performance runs for about five hours.
Terry Teachout
#6. I'd gone to her directly from Dr. Shaw's office - gone without an appointment to find out if happiness was a football you caught or something more complicated, something you had to invent.
Wally Lamb
#7. On Shaw's principle that "if you don't get what you like, you better like what you get,
F. Scott Fitgerald
#8. Awesome. Seth Walters was one of my very favorite people on the planet. It always gave me the warm fuzzies when he was around, and based on Mr. Shaw's expression, I wasn't the only one who thought he was only slightly less nasty than a port-a-potty at a Burning Man festival.
April White
#9. As the late afternoon sun shone in Shaw's face and a soft flower-scented wind cooled him, his unhappiness turned to a detachment that was not at all unpleasant. He was utterly alone in the world. This knowledge thrilled him.
Gore Vidal
#10. One hardly knows which is the more appalling: the abjectness of the credulity or the flippancy of the scepticism.
- Shaw's Preface
George Bernard Shaw
#11. At 83 Shaw's mind was perhaps not quite as good as it used to be, but it was still better than anyone else's.
Alexander Woollcott
#12. Shaw's works make me admire the magnificent tolerance and broadmindedness of the english.
James Joyce
#13. And all Jess knew about Gwen was that she threatened Brendon Shaw's cranky sister with acid during the wedding. Not that Jess blamed her or anything, because Marissa Shaw could be a real bitch, but Lock deserved a lovely sow who loved him, pampered him, and understood his obsession with honey.
Shelly Laurenston
#14. You may be able to read Bernard Shaw's plays, you may be able to quote Shakespeare or Voltaire or some new philosopher; but if you in yourself are not intelligent, if you are not creative, what is the point of this education?
Jiddu Krishnamurti
#15. There are scores of thousands of human insects who are ready at a moment's notice to reveal the Will of God on every possible subject
George Bernard Shaw
#16. A radical shift in attitude happens in small steps. It's a transformation. A butterfly does a lot of walking and eating and growing before it finally forms a chrysalis and emerges with wings. It's not an instant transformation.
Rohvannyn Shaw
#17. Warhol was a prime example of a schizoid person. Maybe he had Asperger's, or maybe he was just an amorous human being on earth.
Jim Shaw
#18. An absolutely necessary part of a writer's equipment, almost as necessary as talent, is the ability to stand up under punishment, both the punishment the world hands out and the punishment he inflicts upon himself.
Irwin Shaw
#19. Theater is dangerously open to repetition. It's exciting when you hit on a new way.
Fiona Shaw
#20. His father looked wistful. 'And you don't feel anticlimatic?'
What's that?'
Somewhat the opposite of elated.'
What's elated again?'
Good feelings. That is to say, very good. You can feel, can't you? That's what I'm driving at. You don't ever wonder ... where feeling went?
Ali Shaw
#21. The nation's morals are like its teeth: the more decayed they are the more it hurts to touch them.
George Bernard Shaw
#22. I have never let gender get in my way. It has taken me over 30 years to get from a garage to the huge campus that we have today. And it's been a long journey.
Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
#23. Without danger I cannot be great. That is how I pay for Abel's blood. Danger and fear follow my steps everywhere. Without them courage would have no sense. And it is courage, courage, courage that raises the blood of life to crimson splendor.
George Bernard Shaw
#24. It's such an awkward, strange thing that was concocted, to have auditions. Back in the old days, you'd just have a screen test, and they'd say, 'Oh, you seem natural in front of the camera,' and you'd just go do 10 pictures for Paramount or whatever.
Vinessa Shaw
#25. I feel like I have to avoid certain thrift store-isms, having been known for the thrift store paintings. It's like I have to not paint that way.
Jim Shaw
#26. The brewing industry is a very, very male dominated industry. It's a male bastion.
Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
#27. I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend ... if you have one."
- George Bernard Shaw, playwright (to Winston Churchill)
"Cannot possibly attend first night; will attend second, if there is one."
- Churchill's response
George Bernard Shaw
#29. Vulgarity is a necessary part of a complete author's equipment; and the clown is sometimes the best part of the circus.
George Bernard Shaw
#30. It is ridiculous to say that art has nothing to do with morality. What is true is that the artist's business is not that of the policeman.
George Bernard Shaw
#31. There's such a cynicism about the phrase 'I laughed all the way to the bank.' It's as though money is what you're doing, rather than playing music. If you're playing a money game, why not get into banking?
Artie Shaw
#32. I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like the state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind.
George Bernard Shaw
#33. Suppose the world were only one of God's jokes, would you work any the less to make it a good joke instead of a bad one?
George Bernard Shaw
#34. A child hasn't a grown-up person's appetite for affection. A little of it goes a long way with them; and they like a good imitation of it better than the real thing, as every nurse knows.
George Bernard Shaw
#35. Writing is finally play, and there's no reason why you should get paid for playing.
Irwin Shaw
#36. Because you are created in God's image, you belong to no one, not to me, not to your mother, not even to yourself, you only belong to Him, WHo made yu and gave you His life.
Shaw J. Dallal
#38. There's so much art and it's gotten so flashy. In the global marketplace, having art that's shiny and has neon lights is almost what you need for anyone to notice it in an art fair situation - and art fairs seem to be more and more the only thing there is.
Jim Shaw
#39. I hate the title of being called 'the richest woman in India,' but it's the recognition that this was the value that I had created as a woman entrepreneur, and that makes me very, very proud.
Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
#40. Regarding the mantra ... "There is no overtraining" Just because you can handle large amounts of volume doesn't mean it's needed. That's the crux of the issue. Just because the body can tolerate something doesn't mean it's a necessity for progress. This is simply poor logic.
Steve Shaw
#41. You never know who's going to be in the audience. You never know who is going to be hearing that piece for the first time, and you never know who is going to be hearing that piece for the last time.
Robert Shaw
#42. Justice is justice though it's always delayed and finally done only by mistake.
George Bernard Shaw
#43. I feel like schizoid is a precursor to schizophrenia or manic depression. I feel like I'm manic. I have parts of schizoid, parts of Asperger's. I'm a smorgasbord of neuroses.
Jim Shaw
#44. He's an even-tempered stallion. What he lacks in stamina he makes up for in speed, kind of like most of the men I've slept with.
Lila Shaw
#45. Carver's best book yet! FROM A CHANGELING STAR combines deft characterization and fascinating extrapolation into a complex, compulsively readable thriller. I wish all science fiction novels could be this good.
Craig Shaw Gardner
#46. I loathe bad theater and most theatre is very bad because it's repetitious, unexciting and, dangerously, it is sometimes praised for those things.
Fiona Shaw
#47. That is what all the poets do: they talk to themselves outloud and the world overhears them. But it's horribly lonely not to hear someone else talk sometimes.
George Bernard Shaw
#48. The bride's getting ready to toss her bouquet, so get me up there! Mom said the day after she turned 96.
June Shaw
#49. It's all that the young can do for the old, to shock them and keep them up to date.
George Bernard Shaw
#50. The seven deadly sins ... food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children. Nothing can lift those seven millstones from Man's neck but money; and the spirit cannot soar until the millstones are lifted.
George Bernard Shaw
#52. In a novel, it's hard to keep track of everybody.
Irwin Shaw
#53. In theory it may seem all right to some, but when it comes to being made the instrument of the Lord's vengeance, I myself don't like it.
Robert Gould Shaw
#55. It's so hard to know what to do when one wishes earnestly to do right.
George Bernard Shaw
#56. Curiously, the United States is full of writers who have one big work in their life and that's all.
Irwin Shaw
#57. A day's work is a day's work, neither more nor less, and the man or woman who does it needs a day's sustenance, a night's repose and due leisure, whether they be painter or ploughman.
George Bernard Shaw
#59. Be a vegetarian. That was the best advice I ever took. It means I'm not involved in killing, that's the main thing.
Martin Shaw
#62. How can she? She's incapable of understanding anything. Besides, do any of us understand what we are doing? If we did, would we ever do it?
George Bernard Shaw
#63. The real pleasure of one's life is the devotion to a great objective of one's consideration.
George Bernard Shaw
#64. You know why God's so hard to find, Trevor? No, Mr. Shaw, I say, why is God so hard to find? God's so hard to find because he ain't lost!
Ryan Winfield
#65. It's usually pointed out that women are not fit for political power, and ought not to be trusted with a vote because they are politically ignorant, socially prejudiced, narrow-minded, and selfish. True enough, but precisely the same is true of men!
George Bernard Shaw
#66. Everyone's been on a ramen noodle diet once or twice.
Kim Shaw
#67. A sensitive boy's humiliations may be very good fun for ordinary thick-skinned grown-ups; but to the boy himself theyareso acute, so ignominious, that he cannot confess themcannot but deny them passionately.
George Bernard Shaw
#68. Alright, he's chucking his toys out the basket and Gary Shaw has a big mouth and shouts a lot.
Joe Calzaghe
#69. I'm not very good at dating. I'm very decisive. If I like someone, then they're my boyfriend. It's pretty straightforward.
Vinessa Shaw
#70. Sometimes someone else's life can be the only thing that makes sense of your own.
Ali Shaw
#71. My schooling did me a great deal of harm and no good whatever; it was simply dragging a child's soul through the dirt.
George Bernard Shaw
#73. The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them. That's the essence of inhumanity.
George Bernard Shaw
#74. Now,' Elias said, 'if only I didn't have to go home to my lousy wife. I married her in 1929. A lot of things've changed since 1929.' He sighed. 'What's a woman?' he asked. 'A Woman is a trap.
Irwin Shaw
#75. Well, sir, you never can tell. That's a principle in life with me, sir, if you'll excuse my having such a thing.
George Bernard Shaw
#76. Sometimes to escape the noise of haunting memories, you need your best friends hand in your own, to help erase the sound and fill you with a sense of peace, even if it's temporary.
Andrea Michelle
#77. Tanner: My dear Tavy, your pious English habit of regarding the world as a moral gymnasium built expressly to strengthen your character in leads you to think about your own confounded principles when you should be thinking about other people's necessities.
George Bernard Shaw
#78. I try to look on the sunny side of life. If something dramatic happens to me, I always try to recount it as a comedy tale, rather than a victim's story.
Suzanne Shaw
#79. God's trustiest lieutenants often lack official credentials. They may be professed atheists who are also men of honour and high public spirit.
George Bernard Shaw
#80. Of course there's a risk that that could happen, but what is the alternative? To never allow myself to get close to anyone ever again? Never know the joy of loving someone for fear that it could end up in tears? My heart might stay safe, but it wouldn't be much of a life.
Chantelle Shaw
#81. Like most lit nerds, I'm a voracious reader. I never got enough poetry under my belt growing up but I do read it - some of my favorites, Gina Franco and Angela Shaw and Cornelius Eady and Kevin Young, remind me daily that unless the words sing and dance, what's the use of putting them down on paper.
Junot Diaz
#83. But that's the thing about East Texas. Red dirt never quite washes out, and pine pollen is tenacious as original sin. You can leave East Texas, for Houston, for the Metroplex, for the Commonwealth, for New York, or Bonn or Tokyo or Kowloon; but you can never quite leave it behind.
Markham Shaw Pyle
#84. In these days of political, personal and economic disintegration, music is not a luxury, it's a necessity; not simply because it is therapeutic, nor because it is the universal language, but because it is the persistent focus of our intelligence, aspiration and goodwill.
Robert Shaw
#85. Bernard Shaw said that when you copy yourself, you know you've got style. And I feel that if you can write like you write, then you are true to yourself. And it's not an easy thing to do - it's a disgustingly difficult thing to do.
Bruce Robinson
#86. If there was twenty ways of telling the truth and only one way of telling a lie, the Government would find it out. It's in the nature of governments to tell lies.
George Bernard Shaw
#87. Security, the chief pretense of civilization, cannot exist where the worst of dangers, the danger of poverty, hangs over everyone's head.
George Bernard Shaw
#89. Remember how beautiful you were?" he whispered. It was a cruel thing to embed in a woman's compact, but he'd found a million uses for the thing. Made him feel like he was helping it redeem itself.
Clovia Shaw
#90. Programmers are like magicians who fool everyone into thinking they are perfect and never wrong, but it's all an act. They make mistakes all the time.
Zed A. Shaw
#91. It's a dangerous thing to be married right up to the hilt, like my daughter's husband. The man is at home all day, like a damned soul in hell.
George Bernard Shaw
#92. There's so many bigger things in the world. The art world is such a tiny little thing compared to wars and migration crises. It's weird to be self-absorbed in it.
Jim Shaw
#93. A healthy nation is as unconscious of its nationality as a healthy man of his bones. But if you break a person's nationality it will think of nothing else but getting it set again.
George Bernard Shaw
#94. Eventually our whole world, every culture, will explode and we'll all just be fucking cosmic dust. We'll all dissipate. We'll all be nothing and everything. What's more spiritual than that?
Dash Shaw
#95. That's because superstition has it that the first person who gets up from a party of thirteen will die?"
"Precisely. I believe Agatha Christie even wrote a mystery about it.
David Baldacci
#96. Make sure you spend time learning how to think and learning how to learn. It's okay to have fun, but try to cultivate interests that might actually be useful. And whatever you do, if you are going to spend time on it, do it well.
Rohvannyn Shaw
#97. In an article on Bunyan lately published in the "Contemporary Review" - the only article on the subject worth reading on the subject I ever saw (yes, thank you, I am familiar with Macaulay's patronizing prattle about "The Pilgrim's Progress") etc.
George Bernard Shaw
#98. The test of a man or woman's breeding is how they behave in a quarrel.
George Bernard Shaw
#99. I don't want to write every week, it's too much trouble, and I shall only write when I want something. If you think I'm sick when I don't write, you can send for me to come and tell you.
Robert Gould Shaw
#100. I worked with Judi Dench in Cranford. She's not at all starry, she's very easy and funny to be around, but I had such an enormous respect and regard for her before I met her that I was quite starstruck.
Martin Shaw
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