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Gore Vidal Quotes

34 quotations by Gore Vidal

QuoteWriting fiction has become a priestly business in countries that have lost their faith.Quote

QuoteWhenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies.Quote

QuoteWhat is in question is a kind of book reviewing which seems to be more and more popular: the loose putting down of opinions as though they were facts, and the treating of facts as though they were opinions.Quote

QuoteWe're not a democracy.Quote

QuoteWe must declare ourselves, become known; allow the world to discover this subterranean life of ours which connects kings and farm boys, artists and clerks. Let them see that the important thing is not the object of love, but the emotion itself.Quote

QuoteUntil the rise of American advertising, it never occurred to anyone anywhere in the world that the teenager was a captive in a hostile world of adults.Quote

QuoteToday's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books, and there is some evidence that they can't read them either.Quote

QuoteThink of the earth as a living organism that is being attacked by billions of bacteria whose numbers double every forty years. Either the host dies, or the virus dies, or both die.Quote

QuoteThere is no human problem which could not be solved if people would simply do as I advise.Quote

QuoteThe theater needs continual reminders that there is nothing more debasing than the work of those who do well what is not worth doing at all.Quote

QuoteThe greatest pleasure when I started making money was not buying cars or yachts but finding myself able to have as many freshly typed drafts as possible.Quote

QuoteThe genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return.Quote

QuoteThe four most beautiful words in our common language: I told you so.Quote

QuoteThe corporate grip on opinion in the United States is one of the wonders of the Western world. No First World country has ever managed to eliminate so entirely from its media all objectivity - much less dissent.Quote

QuoteThat loyal retainer of the Chase Manhattan Bank, the American president.Quote

QuoteThat is sad until one recalls how many bad books the world may yet be spared because of the busyness of writers.Quote

QuoteSex is. There is nothing more to be done about it. Sex builds no roads, writes no novels and sex certainly gives no meaning to anything in life but itself.Quote

QuoteOne is sorry one could not have taken both branches of the road. But we were not allotted multiple selves.Quote

QuoteNow you have people in Washington who have no interest in the country at all. They're interested in their companies, their corporations grabbing Caspian oil.Quote

QuoteNever have children, only grandchildren.Quote

QuoteMany writers who choose to be active in the world lose not virtue but time, and that stillness without which literature cannot be made.Quote

QuoteIt's not enough to succeed. Others must fail.Quote

QuoteIt is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.Quote

QuoteIn writing and politicking, it's best not to think about it, just do it.Quote

QuoteI never miss a chance to have sex or appear on television.Quote

QuoteEvery time a friend succeeds, I die a little.Quote

QuoteBy the time a man gets to be presidential material, he's been bought ten times over.Quote

QuoteAs societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.Quote

QuoteApparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates.Quote

QuoteAndy Warhol is the only genius I've ever known with an I.Q. of 60.Quote

QuoteAll in all, I would not have missed this century for the world.Quote

QuoteAll children alarm their parents, if only because you are forever expecting to encounter yourself.Quote

QuoteA narcissist is someone better looking than you are.Quote

QuoteA good deed never goes unpunished.Quote