A Reputation Quotes & Sayings

Do you like to read?" I asked, pointing at my little shelf.
Moses eyed my books. "Yes."
His answer surprised me. Maybe it was his reputation as a gang banging delinquent. Maybe it was because of the way he looked. But he didn't seem like the type who enjoyed sitting quietly with a book.
"What's your favorite book?" I sounded suspicious and his eyes tightened.
"I like Catcher in the Rye. The Outsiders, 1984, Of Mice and Men, Dune, Starship Troopers, Lord of the Rings. Anything by Tom Clancy or JK Rowling."
He said JK Rowling quickly, like he didn't want to admit to being a Potter fan. But I was stunned. — Amy Harmon

What's wrong with unicorns?" she demanded from behind him, her chalk sounding as it scraped the ground. "They're a noble and - "
"They're a noble and incredibly girly animal," Joel said. "I've got my masculine reputation to think of."
"Oh hush, you," she said. "You'll deal with unicorns - maybe some flower people and a pegasus or two - and you'll like it. Otherwise, you can just go draw your own circle, thank you very much. — Brandon Sanderson

And though I might have learnt more wit and advanced my understanding by living in a Court, yet being dull, fearful and bashful, I neither heeded what was said or practised, but just what belonged to my loyal duty and my own honest reputation. — Margaret Cavendish

[H]is 'philosophy' seemed to consist of anything that would be particularly annoying to the powers that be without being so shocking that they would fire him. He got the reputation among the students as an original and a rebel without having to pay the penalty for actually being either. — Orson Scott Card

The idea of reputation, influence, and influencers in the offline world is as old as the hills. It's not new on the web either, but semantic search is creating a portable sense of identity, reputation, and influence that in the days before it simply did not exist. And this is changing everything — David Amerland

It is well known that no person who regards his reputation will ever kill a trout with anything but a fly. It requires some training on the part of the trout to take to this method. — Charles Dudley Warner

First, make yourself a reputation for being a creative genius. Second, surround yourself with partners who are better than you are. Third, leave them to go get on with it. — David Ogilvy

When your LinkedIn Profile doesn't sync with your Facebook persona, you are on a verge of sinking your brand — Bernard Kelvin Clive

Switching over to a hybrid car is one of those right things, but, unfairly or not, it still has a reputation among car enthusiasts as something you have to pedal really fast when you're on the ramp merging into traffic on the 401. — Linwood Barclay

In-N-Out Burger has a well-known and long standing reputation as a corporation that is operated with a Christian message and philosophy. — Lynsi Torres

Farmer Giles went home feeling very uncomfortable. He was finding that a local reputation may require keeping up, and that may prove awkward. — J.R.R. Tolkien

It's always struck me as funny that guys with scars get a reputation for being hard. It's the ones that cut them you should be looking out for, right? — Louise Welsh

I've been hounded by a reputation of being difficult when really what I'm being is truthful and honest. And I think that's been a thorn in my side. — Gabrielle Anwar

All the London ton acknowledged Scotland as a barbaric place. The packs there cared very little for the social niceties of daytime folk. Highland werewolves had a reputation for doing atrocious and highly unwarranted things, like wearing smoking jackets to the dinner table. Lyall shivered at the delicious horror of the very idea. — Gail Carriger

Ever since I became a Muslim, I've had to deal with attempts to damage my reputation and countless insinuations seeking to cast doubt on my character and trying to connect me to causes which I do not subscribe to. — Cat Stevens

Gain a modest reputation for being unreliable and you will never be asked to do a thing. — Paul Theroux

Making 'Birdsong,' on the one hand you have how prestigious it is and the reputation of the book, which is something that's an extraordinary piece of work. Sebastian Faulkes is a genius. So you feel that responsibility when you're portraying that character that he's imagined and millions of readers have pictured. — Eddie Redmayne

Truthfully, there's nothing mysterious about Public Relations. It's all about how your client - whether it's a company, an individual, a foundation, a music group - relates to the public. Central to this is their reputation. — Ed Zitron

It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety. — Isaac Asimov

I know stereotypes have a bad reputation, people say, "Oh, you shouldn't stereotype people," but I think it's important to recognize that we couldn't function in the world without stereotypes. — W. J. T. Mitchell

I'm sure they just felt more comfortable talking to me.'
'Why would I make them so uncomfortable?' Mulder asked.
Scully faced him, hesitating... 'It's probably because of your... reputation.'
'Reputation?' he echoed, sounding puzzled. 'I have a reputation?'
Mulder was deliberately giving her a hard time... 'They feel your methods, your theories are...'
'Spooky?' Mulder guessed. 'What about you? You think I'm... spooky? — Ellen Steiber

I have the reputation for having read all of Henry James. Which would argue a misspent youth and middle age. — James Thurber

Even as a child I was fascinated by death, not in a spiritual sense, but in an aesthetic one. A hamster or guinea pig would pass away, and, after burying the body, I'd dig it back up: over and over, until all that remained was a shoddy pelt. It earned me a certain reputation, especially when I moved on to other people's pets. "Igor," they called me. "Wicked, spooky." But I think my interest was actually fairly common, at least among adolescent boys. At that age, death is something that happens only to animals and grandparents, and studying it is like a science project. — David Sedaris

As the U.S. trade deficit, and the portion of that deficit attributed to China, continue to grow, our own economy is at risk of losing its reputation as a leader in world trade. — Jo Ann Emerson

Reputation is not a treatise you write on your own behavior. Other people write it, and other people keep it. — Calvin Miller

Image is everything. You don't spare any expense to create the right image. And word of mouth is critical. Once you get a good reputation, momentum will carry you. — Haruki Murakami

Turning to Ann Gower, she smiled. "You're a good woman, Ann Gower."
Ann Gower drew back and looked askance at Mary. "Don't you go ruinin' me reputation, Mary Abacus. I be a real bad woman, but a bloody good whore, and you knows it! — Bryce Courtenay

Highland werewolves had a reputation for doing atrocious and highly unwarranted *things*, like wearing smoking jackets to the dinner table. — Gail Carriger

Much of the country cursed Aaron Burr. He never recovered his political reputation. He wandered Europe for several years. When he was an old man, a thoughtful Aaron said, 'I should have known the world was wide enough for Hamilton and me. — Don Brown

Once your reputation's done/ You can live a life of fun — Gregor Von Rezzori

You get trapped by stories. Though I've got this reputation for being out of control, it's not true, it just happens to be a more interesting story than the truth. — Terry Gilliam

It's hard to maintain a reputation for being grim and mysterious when you're accompanied by a brightly clad young thing, skipping merrily along at your side, holding your hand, and smiling sweetly on one and all. — Simon R. Green

The reputation of a Don Juan gives to a man the most dangerous power. Wise virgins resist it, but foolish virgins frequently yield to the desire to take a celebrated lover from a rival - even from a friend. This emotion is a complex one, mad up of vanity, respect for another woman's taste, and the need to establish self-assurance by winning a difficult victory. Don Juan chose his first mistresses; later he was chosen. — Andre Maurois

People lie for many reasons: to save themselves, to get out of trouble, to avoid hurting someone's feelings. Manipulators lie to get what they want. Narcissists lie to make themselves seem grand to others and themselves. Recovering alcoholics lie to safeguard their tattered reputation. And those who love us most lie to us most of all, because life is a bumpy ride and they want to smooth it out as much as possible. — Ilona Andrews

Despite modifying his writing to suit the audiences, despite writing plays to draw large crowds, despite using other people's materials and copying plotlines from history, Shakespeare remains the preeminent artist of the English language and his reputation has reached such stratospheric heights as to border on idolatry (or Bardolatry as some people call it). Shakespeare was a product of his time and learned from his peers, but his plays transcend his time as all great works do - his genius is his own. As Ralph Waldo Emerson put it, Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare? — William Shakespeare

It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it. — Benjamin Franklin

For a long period of history, you were what people said about you, and if your reputation was stained, you were in very serious trouble. People fought duels over this. Then it fades away historically. — James Lasdun

She thought, watching him, 'I am in a bath, naked in a bath with no bubbles, and a man is washing me; my reputation is doomed and to hell with it. I've been to hell and all I wanted in it was to be alive for this man. Who carried me out of it. — Ariana Franklin

Service standards keep rising. As competitors render better and better service, customers become more demanding. Their expectations grow. When every company's service is shoddy, doing a few things well can earn you a reputation as the customer's savior. But when a competitor emerges from the pack as a service leader, you have to do a lot of things right. Suddenly achieving service leadership costs more and takes longer. It may even be impossible if the competition has too much of a head start. The longer you wait, the harder it is to produce outstanding service. — Bill Davidow

People don't turn away from an attorney sitting in a wheelchair. If the guy has got the reputation for being the best attorney around, that's who you go with. But in show business, for some reason they're still reluctant to say an attorney or a physician or an interior decorator can be in a chair, or on crutches, or blind or any of the other things. — Gerald McRaney

The name itself is trouble. "Slough" means, literally, muddy field. A snake sloughs, or sheds, its dead skin. John Bunyan wrote of the "slough of despond" in Pilgrim's Progress. In the 1930s, John Betjeman wrote this poem about Slough: Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough! It isn't fit for humans now, There isn't grass to graze a cow, Swarm over, Death! Then he got nasty. To this day, the residents of Slough rankle when anyone mentions the poem. The town's reputation as a showpiece of quiet desperation was cemented when the producers of the TV series The Office decided to set the show in Slough. — Eric Weiner

I was spoiled and I was arrogant. I was very demanding, had an overblown image of who I was and got a reputation for being difficult. And rightfully so. — Judge Reinhold

A single lie destroys a whole reputation of integrity. — Baltasar Gracian

The English also had a reputation, shared with the Dutch, for blowing up their ships to avoid capture. In 1611, for instance, the Spanish Admiral Don Pedro de toledo captured a Turkish pirate ship, but its English consort, 'being wont to seek a voluntary death rather than yield, blew up their ship when they saw resistance useless'. Blowing up their ships, or at least threatening to do so, would become standard pirate practice. — Peter Earle

His lack of condemnatory zeal gave him a reputation in the religious hierarchy that ensured he would always remain a humble teacher in a backwater town. — Richard K. Morgan

What it takes to reach this place I'm speaking about is to be in spirit. You shift who you are away from what you have, what you do, what your reputation is, what people think of you, and all of that ego-based thinking. You shift into the understanding that who you are is a piece of God - who you are is a piece of the source - and when you stay connected to that in your thoughts you inspire others to do the same. — Wayne Dyer

There is a very great difference - is there not? - between the temporal and the eternal judgments, a very great difference between a man's reputation and a man's character, for reputation is what men think and say of us, while character is what God and the angels know of us. — Price Collier

However much of time, labor, or other means it takes to establish a reputation, it frequently happens that it requires nearly as much to maintain it. One who has written a good book, is expected on all occasions to "talk like a book." Or, if one has achieved an act of heroism, he is expected to perform acts of heroism for the edification of all who approach him. There are people who can never believe they see a lion unless they hear him roar. — Christian Nestell Bovee

Do you know the real secret of how Presidents become Presidents?" Before I can answer, he explains, "It's because they're good at getting people to do things for them. In fact, they're not just good at it. They're maestros. Virtuosos. To get that title of President, you need thousands of people doing thousands of different things, all for your benefit. It's a massive churning machine. And y'know what feeds that machine?" he asks. "People like you, Beecher. It's fed with your life, and your family, and your reputation. Because when things go wrong ... and they always go wrong ... the President isn't allowed to have that skunk smell around him. So when that happens, he doesn't just replace you. He crumples you up, tosses you out back, and ... chomp goes the woodchipper. — Brad Meltzer

No more self-defeating device could be discovered than the one society has developed in dealing with the criminal. It proclaims his career in such loud and dramatic forms that both he and the community accept the judgment as a fixed description. He becomes conscious of himself as a criminal, and the community expects him to live up to his reputation, and will not credit him if he does not live up to it. — Frank Tannenbaum

Heinrich had a reputation locally for cunning, but Ankh-Morpork had overtaken cunning a thousand years ago, had sped past devious, had left artful far behind, and had now, by a roundabout route, arrived at straightforward. — Terry Pratchett

Father Michaels' sermon was mercifully short. He had a reputation for three-minute homilies, tightly written, provocative and insightful. His words centered on the true meaning of Christianity. That is was all about love. Love of God, love of self, love of family, love of community.
Love was a gift. — Dorothea Benton Frank

Yeah? How was I?"
"You were . . . kind of perfect" I say
"Kind of?" Alec throws his hands out to his sides, pretending to be offended. "Can I try again? I'd hate for my reputation to be spoiled by a 'kind of. — Brian James

Everyone assumes writers spend their time lounging around, writing and occasionally striking a pose whilst having a think. — Sara Sheridan

I did it to protect my good reputation in case anyone ever caught me walking around with crab apples in my cheeks. With rubber balls in my hands I could deny there were crab apples in my cheeks. Everytime someone asked me why I was walking around with crab apples in my cheeks, I'd just open my hands and show them it was rubber balls I was walking around with, not crab apples, and that they were in my hands, not my cheeks. It was a good story, but I never knew if it got across or not, since its pretty hard to make people understand you when your talking to them with two crab apples in your cheeks. — Joseph Heller

You must never try to make all the money that's in a deal. Let the other fellow make some money too, because if you have a reputation for always making all the money, you won't have many deals. — J. Paul Getty

We live in a culture that celebrates talent more than integrity, but we've got it backward. Talent depreciates over time. So do intellect and appearance. You will eventually lose your strength and lose your looks. You may even lose your mind. But you don't have to lose your integrity. Integrity is the only thing that doesn't depreciate over time. Nothing takes longer to build than a godly reputation. And nothing is destroyed more quickly by one stroke of sin. That's why it must be celebrated and protected above all else. — Mark Batterson

I am 54 years old and happily single. In addition to my nuclear family, I have a close circle of friends. Most of my friends are men. But my reputation is such that their female partners would never consider me a threat. — Geraldine Lee Wei Ling

Women's liberation is one thing, but the permeation of anti-male sentiment in post-modern popular culture - from our mocking sitcom plots to degrading commercial story lines - stands testament to the ignorance of society. Fair or not, as the lead gender that never requested such a role, the historical male reputation is quite balanced.
For all of their perceived wrongs, over centuries they've moved entire civilizations forward, nurtured the human quest for discovery and industry, and led humankind from inconvenient darkness to convenient modernity. Navigating the chessboard that is human existence is quite a feat, yet one rarely acknowledged in modern academia or media. And yet for those monumental achievements, I love and admire the balanced creation that is man for all his strengths and weaknesses, his gifts and his curses. I would venture to say that most wise women do. — Tiffany Madison

Joel Lane documents a life we don't quite live, in a city we can't quite find: half glimpsed and half imagined, we know it's out there somewhere. Waiting, maybe. Mixing fear with desire, reputation with regret. Touching the blood-beat of our secret hunger with the rhythms of a music that never felt alien till now. Wasted lives, with never a wasted word. It's an extraordinary achievement: vivid as neon, real as rain. Devastating. — Chaz Brenchley

By the spring of 1963, Las Vegas was made up of an odd convergence of gamblers, gangsters, and government. All three forces, intentionally or unintentionally, catered to every kind of human weakness. Although the aboveground nuclear blasts were gone, the town was still full of glitzy, beckoning casinos; flamboyant, roguish celebrities; down-and-out and entrepreneurial prostitutes; and notorious, brutal criminals. By now it had gained its much deserved reputation as "Sin City" - universally considered a town where "just about anything goes." And surrounding it were the infamous "holes in the desert." Many of Las Vegas's problems were known to be buried in those same holes.
So, naturally, as a woman who relished audacity, this would be the place to which my mother would move my sister and me. As it turned out, that was the other part of her telephone call's "exciting news. — Gary Spetz

A single inattention may lose a chess game, whereas a single successful approach to a problem, among many which have been relegated to the wastebasket, will make a mathematician's reputation. — Norbert Wiener

Buonaparte was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He has got splendid soldiers. Besides he began by attacking Germans. And only idlers have failed to beat the Germans. Since the world began everybody has beaten the Germans. They beat no one - except one another. He made his reputation fighting them. — Leo Tolstoy

As a lawyer who has dealt in defamation, I know that someone's reputation has to be lowered in the eyes of right-thinking people to sue. — David Hunt

The other side of the coin is that fans can panic players into making poor decisions. The more unsettled a crowd gets, the worse the football on show will become - I've seen it a million times. Certain grounds have a reputation. Whenever I've played at Wolverhampton Wanderers or West Ham United , every manager has said "Keep this lot quiet for 20 minutes, and their fans will start getting on their back". — The Secret Footballer

The internet has opened the door for millions of businesses to do things differently, because there are other assets now, assets that can transcend location. Your permission to talk to customers, your reputation, your unique products-you can build a business around them online. — Seth Godin

Give a man a reputation as an early riser and he can sleep 'til noon. — Mark Twain

Sighing, he rubbed his forehead, leaving a smear of black ash. "I've temporally blocked the collective because I can't answer that many calls at once, but pretty soon, I'm going to be entertaining. Lots and lots of irate, angry demons in my tiny little living room. It will be embarrassing. My reputation will be utterly ruined. I don't have enough chairs," he finished nlightly, turning his lip in and chewing on it. (Al) — Kim Harrison

Yet Malone, remarkably, was a model of restraint compared with others, such as John Payne Collier, who was also a scholar of great gifts, but grew so frustrated at the difficulty of finding physical evidence concerning Shakespeare's life that he began to create his own, forging documents to bolster his arguments if not, ultimately, his reputation. He was eventually exposed when the keeper of mineralogy at the British Museum proved with a series of ingenious chemical tests that several of Collier's "discoveries" had been written in pencil and then traced over and that the ink in the forged passages was demonstrably not ancient. It was essentially the birth of forensic science. This was in 1859. — Bill Bryson

Look, everybody in journalism has a reputation of sorts. — Bernard Goldberg

A good reputation may be worth millions,
but a good character is worth all the riches of the world. — Matshona Dhliwayo

If you fellows have been hunted from one end of the country to the other as I have been, you'll understand what a bad man's reputation is built on. I've had credit for more killings than I ever dreamt of — Doc Holliday

The shortcomings of economics are not original error but uncorrected obsolescence. The obsolescence has occurred because what is convenient has become sacrosanct. Anyone who attacks such ideas must seem to be a trifle self-confident and even aggressive. The man who makes his entry by leaning against an infirm door gets an unjustified reputation for violence. Something is to be attributed to the poor state of the door. — John Kenneth Galbraith

I hate to say anything that may hurt UCLA, but I can't be quiet when I see what the NCAA is doing to Jerry Tarkanian only because he has a reputation for giving a second chance to many black athletes other coaches have branded as troublemakers. The NCAA is working night and day trying to get Jerry, but no one from the NCAA ever questioned me during my four years at UCLA! — Bill Walton

One man lies in his words, and gets a bad reputation; another in his manners, and enjoys a good one. — Henry David Thoreau

Despite its reputation, Appalachia - especially northern Alabama and Georgia to southern Ohio - has far lower church attendance than the Midwest, parts of the Mountain West, and much of the space between Michigan and Montana. Oddly enough, we think we attend church more than we actually do. In a recent Gallup poll, Southerners and Midwesterners reported the highest rates of church attendance in the country. Yet actual church attendance is much lower in the South. — J.D. Vance

That loss of virtue in a female is irretrievable-- that one false step involves her in endless ruin-- that her reputation is no less brittle than it is beautiful-- and that she cannot be too much guarded in her behavior towards the undeserving of the opposite sex." ~Mary Bennett, P&P — Jane Austen

'The Road' was a movie that has a good reputation, even though it wasn't released very well, but that's a movie I'm very proud of. — Viggo Mortensen

In my wide travels across the world and my meetings with various heads of states, be that Africa or South Asia, Singapore or in high level meetings in the U.S., U.K. or Japan, one common mention is about Dr. Singh's extraordinary reputation as a Wise Man, an outstanding Economist and a fine Gentleman. — Sunil Mittal

For a nation which has an almost evil reputation for bustle, bustle, bustle, and rush, rush, rush, we spend an enormous amount of time standing around in line in front of windows, just waiting. — Robert Benchley

Catholics have a reputation for severity, for judgment that comes down heavily. — Yann Martel

Finally, by making activism our priority, we fashion a reputation as rabble-rousing malcontents and foster hostility toward unbelievers that alienates us from them, and them from us. We need to let go of the notion that culture and — John F. MacArthur Jr.

I'm less concerned about whether being a good corporate citizen burnishes a company's reputation. That's just an added benefit. I believe it's a responsibility, and there is no negotiating on responsibilities. — Ursula Burns

Any woman may act the part of a coquette successfully who has the reputation without the scruples of modesty. If a woman passes the bounds of propriety for our sakes, and throws herself unblushingly at our heads, we conclude it is either from a sudden and violent liking, or from extraordinary merit on our parts, either of which is enough to turn any man's head who has a single spark of gallantry or vanity in his composition. — William Hazlitt

Your boy here-" Ware jerked his head in angry indication "can't explain himself worth a damn."
That;s hardly news to me. Nonethelss," Gareth said, "I can't allow you to kill him. His death would be a terrible inconvenience for me."
Ware snorted. "If this is a same of his behavior, his death couldn't be so inconvenient as his life. — Courtney Milan

Mrs. Convoy leaned into the desk, flattening her knuckles on it like a linebacker bracing against the hard earth, and with eyeballs floating above her bifocals asked why I felt it necessary to sit in my own waiting room during peak hours. I told her, she said, "And how is the 'complete experience'?" I told her, she said, "And do you think the 'complete experience' might be enhanced by a dentist who tends to his patients in a timely manner?" I told her, she said, "We will not get a reputation for being a drill-and-bill shop just because you tend to patients in a timely manner. Jesus Mary and Joseph," she said. "Sometimes I think we all work for Toots the Clown. — Joshua Ferris

For all of its well-deserved reputation for pragmatism, American popular culture frequently nurtures or at least tolerates preposterous views and theories. Witness the 9/11 'truthers' who, lacking any evidence whatsoever, claim that 9/11 was a Bush administration plot. — Michael Hayden

Having had a reputation for being sexy is a great prop to lean on now. — Greta Scacchi

It was in this pub he'd learnt that, contrary to the belief of the majority of those laying bets, it is possible to flatten a hundred frogs with a hammer in less than thirty seconds. In short, it was a pub with a reputation. And very slimy walls. — Tony McGuin

The judge's authority depends upon the assumption that he speaks with the mouth of others. That is to say, the momentum of his utterances must be greater than any which his personal reputation and character can command, if it is to do the work assigned to it if it is to stand against the passionate resentments arising out of the interests he must frustrate for while a judge must discover some composition with the dominant trends of his times, he must preserve his authority by cloaking himself in the majesty of an overshadowing past. — Learned Hand

This is Huck Finn, a child of mine of shady reputation. Be good to him for his parent's sake. — Mark Twain

The loss of virtue in a female is irretrievable - that one false step involves in her endless ruin - that her reputation is no less brittle than it is beautiful - and that she cannot be too much guarded in her behavior towards the undeserving of the opposite sex. — Jane Austen

Reputation is like a sort of armor, or a weapon you can brandish if need be. — Patrick Rothfuss

Knowing that my granddad was a highly respected actor wasn't necessarily intimidating, but it definitely meant there was always a pressure to live up to his reputation. I think that's why acting wasn't something I even considered doing, as a kid. — Steven R. McQueen

A man's reputation draws eyes upon him that will narrowly inspect every part of him. — Joseph Addison

In M
, an important town in northern Italy, the widowed Marquise of O
, a lady of unblemished reputation and the mother of several well-brought-up children, inserted the following announcement in the newspapers: that she had, without knowledge of the cause, come to find herself in a certain situation; that she would like the father of the child she was expecting to disclose his identity to her; that she was resolved, out of consideration to her family, to marry him. — Heinrich Von Kleist

Many people are very intelligent in accomplishing worldly attainments. This intelligence is not wisdom because worldly attainments such as a high position, reputation, wealth and success in business are deceptive. If we die tomorrow they will disappear tomorrow, and nothing will be left for our future. Wisdom, however, will never deceive us. — Geshe Kelsang Gyatso

I didn't actually think you were hanging out at Hex Hall because of your burning love for me. But that's what I'm telling all the girls back at school," I said, stabbing a forkful of eggs. "I'm thinking 'heartbreaker' might be a nice addition to my 'avenging witch' reputation. — Rachel Hawkins

The world sees only the reflection of merit; therefore when you come to know a really great man intimately, you may as often find him above as below his reputation. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

The drying up a single tear has more, of honest fame, than shedding seas of gore. — Lord Byron