Boyle's Quotes & Sayings

Why ruin my sister's birthday simply because the entire planet was going to hell in a hand basket? — T.C. Boyle

It was then that my gaze happened to fall on the bookcase, on the gap there, where the old paperback of "Nine Stories" had fallen flat. "Where's the thing?" I said.
"What thing?"
"The mesh. My mesh."
She shrugged. "I tossed it."
"Tossed it? Where? What do you mean?"
In the next moment I was in the kitchen, flipping open the lid of the trash can, only to find it empty. "You mean outside?" I shouted. "In the dumpster?"
When I came thundering back into the room, she still hadn't moved. "Jesus, what were you thinking? That was mine. I wanted that. I wanted to keep it."
Her lips barely moved. "It was dirty. — T.C. Boyle

That said, I don't really understand the point of the royal princes joining the army. Why send a couple of pampered party boys like Harry or William in to fight? In a war you need a ruthless, merciless killing machine, someone like Andy McNab, or Prince Philip. Prince Philip is the perfect soldier: he likes shooting things and he's a racist. He'd kill his own daughter-in-law if he thought he could get away with it. — Frankie Boyle

There is a Steve [Jobs] that Apple would like to actually present to the public. They have a character, Steve, and they want to keep that story going. And it's very important that writers challenge that occasionally and not just trust their parent companies to tell them. — Danny Boyle

The average life expectancy rate in some parts of Glasgow is 54. If you've ever been there, you'll realize that that's maybe a bit long. — Frankie Boyle

The moment we pulled up in front of her apartment she had the door open. She turned to me with the long, elegant, mournful face of her Puritan ancestors and held out her hand.
'It's been fun,' she said.
'Yes,' I said, taking her hand.
She was wearing gloves. — T.C. Boyle

I think Danny Boyle's got it in his head that we all still look too young (to do a 'Trainspotting' sequel.) But, I mean, I don't look like anyone I play, anyways, so I don't really know where that comes from. Because, you know, you change yourself for the roles. I'm actually not Scottish, either! — Jonny Lee Miller

If Harry Potter's so magical, why cant he cure his own eyesight and get laid. A teenage lad shouldnt need a broomstick to cling onto. — Frankie Boyle

I introduced Nora as my wife, though that was a lie. Old people, that's what they wanted to hear. If you were married, you were mature, reliable, exactly like them, because in their day men and women didn't just live together
they made a commitment, they had children and went on cruises and built big houses on lakes and filled them with all the precious trinkets and manufactured artifacts they'd collected along the way. — T.C. Boyle

They [my stories] evolve. If they're tightly constructed, it's because they're revised constantly as I move forward each day. That's where the structure inheres. It's all organic. — T.C. Boyle

There are three huge, titanic, space movies which if you ever make a film [about space] you cannot avoid. You may want to avoid them but you cannot. I've never known a genre like it where you are dictated to by these films, 2001, Alien, and Tarkovsky's Solaris. — Danny Boyle

People have to see that there is a high degree of complexity about belonging to a gang. It's a symptom, not a problem. — Greg Boyle

We've all had the experience of you pick up a book, you can't get into it, you can't concentrate.Then one day you pick up the same book and you don't hear the phone ring. You're totally absorbed. Same thing I have to do every day. When you get into that special place of unconsciousness - you get it listening to great music or seeing a great movie - it just takes you out of yourself, out of this whole world. There's no feeling quite like it. — T.C. Boyle

Good storytelling for me is not so much technical expertise, which I know is applauded often; it's actually freshness of approach. It does mean you sometimes stumble and fall and make a horrible mess of things in seeking that freshness, but you should always keep trying to do that. — Danny Boyle

Social equity is based on justice; politics change on the opinion of the time. The black man's skin will be a mark of social inferiority so long as white men are conceited, ignorant, unjust, and prejudiced. You cannot legislate these qualities out of the white - you must steal them out by teaching, illustration, and example. — John Boyle O'Reilly

It's tricky to be such an independent person, from Canada. It doesn't matter how incredible your work is, if you're an unknown person and you're from Toronto, people's eyes glaze over immediately as soon as you introduce yourself. — Shary Boyle

Besides, to like something, to really like it and come out and say so, is taking a terrible risk. I mean, what if I'm wrong? What if it's really no good? — T.C. Boyle

Does anyone actually think that Beckham knows he's in America? I think he just follows a football and all he notices is that it occasionally gets warmer. — Frankie Boyle

The only award I've been nominated for is a Scottish BAFTA. A Scottish BAFTA, it's like hearing that the animals have their own Olympics. You hear all this stuff about TV being faked. Of course it's faked. It's all faked. That documentary a couple of weeks ago about tribal warfare among monkeys, that was all filmed in a Yates wine lodge in Dundee. Comic Relief is faked. Everybody in Africa is fine. — Frankie Boyle

The employer is not going to choose the gang member who's just been released from prison: they're going to choose the person with the skills. — Greg Boyle

It's an interesting thing in this country. I haven't won a gold medal, yet Australians still take me into their houses and hearts, they know my name and they care. I think Aussies like the little Aussie battler and the person who will stand up for their rights and I've never been short of a word, especially with officialdom. — Raelene Boyle

And we who have toiled for freedom's law, have we sought for freedom's soul? Have we learned at last that human right is not a part but the whole? — John Boyle O'Reilly

I think it's a great thing to hear the author reading. I've listened to CDs of Cheever and Updike reading their stories and Hemingway. To hear what their voices were like is amazing. Whether they're reading well or not, it's great to listen to the intonation and the beat of the guy who wrote the story. — T.C. Boyle

It's not going in that end! — T.C. Boyle

Does God feel like that same-sex marriage could happen? I don't think anybody who has a connection to God and God's understanding and depth of compassion who's gonna say 'no.' — Greg Boyle

We live in a cluttered culture, a culture of information in which even our computers can't tell us what's worth knowing and what is merely cultural scrap. In such a society, we don't have the experience of contemplative space, of the time or mood to engage a book of poetry or even read a novel. Who can achieve the unconscious-conscious state of the reader when everything is stimulation, everything is movement and information? — T.C. Boyle

Work saved me. Literature saved me. It sounds corny but it's absolutely true. I was going in the wrong direction, but after the 9,000th night at the bar doing dope with a bunch of Dead Heads, I began to think there was something more. — T.C. Boyle

Tally moved to stand at her sister's side. "Nanny Rana said it was a lady's duty to see that she was the brightest light at the table." She smiled at Felicity, and together they recited, "Never hide your light, for how else is a man to notice you? Your spark, your fire, is your most cherished possession." They both sighed, as if they had just shared the cure for all that ailed the world. Then Tally slanted an assessing glance at Miranda. "I fear, Miss Porter, your light is positively dull." Having — Elizabeth Boyle

There's a kind of mystery to our being and from my point of view, regarding my own parents and their parents, I'd as soon let it lie than find out who my mother's father was. — T.C. Boyle

A mother's rage was too incandescent to blaze unshaded. — T.C. Boyle

People who think there's no good way to die have obviously never heard the phrase 'Drug-fuelled-sex-heart-attack'. — Frankie Boyle

Always changing genres, making very different films is a good idea. It's a way of making yourself feel vulnerable again, getting back to that innocence. As is working within a circumspect budget. — Danny Boyle

Poverty is a funny phenomenon. It is always defined financially and always relative to what other people earn. It is possible to be extremely happy despite having little money and being officially categorised as poverty-stricken. You can also be really unhappy despite earning a high salary. Those who always want something more will always live in poverty, regardless of how much they earn, while those who are content with what they have will always feel they have an abundance. Most poverty in the UK isn't material poverty, it's spiritual poverty, a state of mind in which fulfilment comes only from the pursuit of material gain. — Mark Boyle

For me, it really is about a dialogue. Life can be really isolating or terrifying or euphoric - it's all these things. And while I'm here I want to have an exchange. I want something to vibrate. And I want to be really stimulated ... — Shary Boyle

I was joking earlier when I said that all writers are manic depressives, but it's a joke with a lot of truth behind it. For fiction writers and poets, too, there's something wrong with you and you do this art as a way of correcting it or addressing it in some way. — T.C. Boyle

If I'm doing my job correctly, I'm presenting a scenario for you as the reader to engage with on your own. I mean that's what the best art is supposed to do. — T.C. Boyle

Being sick feels like you're wearing someone else's glasses — Megan Boyle

The desire of God's heart is immeasurably larger than our imaginations can conjure. — Greg Boyle

Danny Boyle has been a huge, has had a huge effect on me. His movies, early movies like Trainspotting and those movies. So I've always loved the energies of those movies. But also, that they are very focused on the characters. Cause it's not only gimmickery, it's not only about visuals. You feel a real need, a love for the main characters. So that's what I've always loved about watching movies myself. — Fredrik Bond

[Wearing padding to make my breasts look larger for a movie] was great, but it also made me think, you know, a lot of women who go out and get implants, what's so insecure about them that they would rather have someone look there than in their eyes? — Lara Flynn Boyle

That did it. With his masculine pride completely trampled beneath her sturdy and practical heel, Jack made a vow. The moment this ends, I am going straight up to London to cut a swath through Society that will ensure my place in history alongside Casanova and every other great rake. There won't be a woman's heart safe from my charms. — Elizabeth Boyle

Scientists have just built the world's biggest supercollider, and they're doing experiments to see what makes up protons. I hope that if the experiment's successful, the whole of our reality will dissolve, and a big sign will up come that says: Level Two. — Frankie Boyle

When you reduce what you need in life to the bare minimum, then that's when you achieve true freedom. — Mark Boyle

It's interesting, the worse things get in cities, the tougher that cities get, the more brutal the humor is. The tougher [things] people face, the darker the sense of humor gets and I find that incredibly optimistic. — Danny Boyle

A man's real and deep feelings are surely those which he acts upon when challenged, not those which, mellow-eyed and soft-voiced, he spouts in easy times. — Sarah-Patton Boyle

The adoption of gloves for all contests will do more to preserve the practice of boxing than any other conceivable means. It will give pugilism new life, not only as a professional boxer's art, but as a general exercise. — John Boyle O'Reilly

I think life is a lot different for alternative kids nowadays. Texting and the internet mean that being a Goth or something means you're part of a big social scene, it's an inclusive thing. Back then, we all just went our different ways in the afterglow,wishing each other all the best with the next ten years of bullying. — Frankie Boyle

To create the reality of space with this sense of suspension: nothing's happening, it's endless; we're traveling at 28,000 kilometers an hour but nothing's happening. Nothing! And you have to do that! There are all these rules you have to follow, I've never known anything like it. — Danny Boyle

Stephen Hawking: Brainier than Kurt Cobain's garage wall. — Frankie Boyle

There is a force that conspires against you. It's called capitalism. It's closing your libraries so you can focus on your conspiracy shit. — Frankie Boyle

The poor evangelize you about what's important and what is the Gospel, and that that's where the joy is. — Greg Boyle

The very genetic determinism I posited in World's End as a way of shaking off my inherited demons is being proven in fact as we map out the human genome. — T.C. Boyle

Everybody wants to solve everybody's problems. — Lara Flynn Boyle

Newton advanced, with one gigantic stride, from the regions of twilight into the noon day of science. A Boyle and a Hooke, who would otherwise have been deservedly the boast of their century, served but as obscure forerunners of Newton's glories. — Thomas Young

The extraordinary thing about India is that it's such a family place. It's full of families everywhere. — Danny Boyle

I like to joke that you usually write more books before death than after death, so that's why I'm doing it. But really, I remain engaged with ideas. There are so many things happening that turn me on and I just want to examine them. — T.C. Boyle

Susan Boyle having a meltdown is not controversial. It's human for a 48-year-old recluse to get a little wigged out when she finds herself on the world stage overnight. — Shawn Amos

One of the things in the Mary Shelley [Frankenstein] is that the creature tells his story, so this begins with the creature's point of view. So, it literally starts with the creature opening his eyes and is born - but is obviously in his 30s. But because they're the creator and the created we thought it would be really interesting if they could look at each other every other night and play each other's roles. — Danny Boyle

Picture this broad: 22 going on 18. Half the guys in my class would have given their left testicle to date her. This cupcake is the guidance counselor the principal has assigned me. Miss Boyle is her name. We all call her "Miss Bubbly Water." Imagine the teasing I have to endure from my friends. Not to mention what it's like, sitting across from this Barbie Doll every Thursday afternoon, watching her cross and uncross her legs, while she's lecturing me about - get this: "staying focused." Right! My pants are on fire, and she's handing me a crash course in Psych 101! — Ted Gargiulo

P.S. If you do not receive this, of course it must have been miscarried; therefore I beg you to write and let me know. — Boyle Roche

The Church should say, 'I'm frightened that women will be ordained;' that's honest, say that. But don't say, 'It's a grave sin,' because that's nonsense. — Greg Boyle

But interestingly its [Star City's] technology is all 1970s - still. In fact, it's alarming because you think, "You're not going to send someone up into space in something that old, are you?" But it works and it always has worked and it doesn't fail and it's incredibly reliable. — Danny Boyle

Your first film is always your best film, in a way. There's something about your first film that you never ever get back to, but you should always try. It's that slight sense of not knowing what you're doing, because the technical skills you learn - especially if you have a film that works, that has some kind of success - are beguiling. The temptation is to use them again, and they're not necessarily good storytelling techniques. — Danny Boyle

The gospel comprises indeed, and unfolds, the whole mystery of man's redemption, as far forth as it is necessary to be known for our salvation. — Robert Boyle

The phaenomena afforded by trades, are a part of the history of nature, and therefore may both challenge the naturalist's curiosity and add to his knowledge, Nor will it suffice to justify learned men in the neglect and contempt of this part of natural history, that the men, from whom it must be learned, are illiterate mechanicks ... is indeed childish, and too unworthy of a philosopher, to be worthy of an honest answer. — Robert Boyle

My dad is one of the funniest people I know. He's the sort of man who can make you laugh just by reading out of a telephone directory ... He's a spastic. — Frankie Boyle

It's easy to like the most popular films, but I have a great fondness for 'A Life Less Ordinary'. — Danny Boyle

I don't know who they are[my characters] . They're entirely invented characters. Maybe that's how I've been able to write so many books, because there are no boundaries for me. I can write a completely fantastical story like "Swept Away" or "Blinded by the Light" and then a non-comic drama like "Chicxulub" or something like "Birnam Wood" that has autobiographical underpinnings. Why not? — T.C. Boyle

You can do anything you like - really - but this [Sci-Fi] is absolutely disciplined, it's Zen, you have to be absolutely focused in an area. You have to zone into an area and you then you can achieve when you get there. It's really weird! — Danny Boyle

Your eyes are the shade of intelligence, able to pierce a man's heart with merely a glance. As they have done so to mine. — Elizabeth Boyle

Above all, Danny Boyle's 'Slumdog Millionaire' is the work of an artist at the peak of his powers. India is his palette, and Mumbai - that teeming 'maximum city', with 19 million strivers on the make, jostling, scheming, struggling and killing for success - is his brush. — Shashi Tharoor

A 5'5", 182-pound, 43-year-old man wearing khaki shorts and a UCLA sweatshirt runs to Nicolas Cage in a manner he will spend the rest of the night describing to his slightly bored but equally boring date as "ambushing." No one else is on the street and Nicolas Cage is unable to avoid the man, who wants a picture with his "brand new Droid." As the man, who actually seems to be vibrating and hovering in an almost hummingbird-like way, adjusts his stance for the third attempt at a picture his crotch lightly brushes Nicolas Cage's upper thigh, causing his face to shift from "bemused resignation" to, strangely, "serene bliss," for what will become the man's inaugural Facebook profile picture. — Megan Boyle

Barack Obama will appeal to both black and white voters in America. White voters who'll think he's Tiger Woods. — Frankie Boyle

This is all very fine, but it won't do-Anatomy-botany-Nonsense! Sir, I know an old woman in Covent Garden, who understands botany better, and as for anatomy, my butcher can dissect a joint full as well; no, young man, all that is stuff; you must go to the bedside, it is there alone you can learn disease!
Comment to Hans Sloane on Robert Boyle's letter of introduction describing Sloane as a 'ripe scholar, a good botanist, a skilful anatomist'. — Thomas Sydenham

Celluloid will be the next decade's black and white. — Danny Boyle

You can reconstruct the picture from chaos and memory's ruins. — Kay Boyle

When I write something, I want the best director to direct it. And that's not going to be me. So when David Fincher comes along and wants to direct 'The Social Network,' when Bennett Miller comes along and wants to direct 'Moneyball,' or when Danny Boyle wants to direct 'Jobs'? Hallelujah. I want them directing it. — Aaron Sorkin

I think that any program that's born from below rather than on high is going to survive. — Greg Boyle

We need not worry so much about what man descends from - it's what he descends to that shames the human race. — Hal Boyle

I think the institution of marriage is a great idea, but for me it's just an idea. — Lara Flynn Boyle

I go around with my books so much and I love to perform on stage, to remind everybody that the lights are off, the phones are off, and for this hour, it's going to be like your mother reading to you. We're going to remember why we love stories. I think that gets lost in over-intellectualizing. — T.C. Boyle

From my point of view, why shouldn't I work in every possible mode, to see if it's viable? "Los Gigantes" would not have worked as a straightforward, naturalistic tale. Part of the fun of it is that it's so preposterous and yet at the same time, it could have happened. Think of eugenics. Hitler certainly would have been doing it if he could have. — T.C. Boyle

Ah, trouble, trouble, there are the two different kinds ... there's the one you give and the other you take. — Kay Boyle

My dad was a labourer and my mum had exactly the same job as Noel Gallagher's mum - she was a dinner lady at our local school. Everyone comes over from Ireland and they get the same jobs. — Danny Boyle

They're always going, don't deal with terrorists. Let's deal with them. What's Allah offering you boys, 100 virgins? We'll give you 50 slags. — Frankie Boyle

I always listen to music while I'm working and I always read aloud to my wife. I love to read aloud to an audience because there's a cadence and a beat. There's a music to the language that's very important to me. — T.C. Boyle

You're not getting the joy out of literature that it gave you. This is the danger of what we do. Look at Hemingway and so many others. You devote your life to one thing, that is what you are. It's artificial but it's all you have. If you lose it, then you're nothing and there's no point in going on. — T.C. Boyle

When I heard Cristiano Ronaldo was pictured holding a manbag, I was surprised it was a gucci bag and not another guy's sack. — Frankie Boyle

I've always been a huge fan of theatre and performance. The idea of just the human voice and just this night. Live music is the same. They're doing it for you right now. It's an amazing thing. And if you perform a story properly, it can be a transporting, too. — T.C. Boyle

I have an idea and a first line
and that suggests the rest of it. I have little concept of what I'm going to say, or where it's going. I have some idea of how long it's going to be
but not what will happen or what the themes will be. That's the intrigue of doing it
it's a process of discovery. You get to discover what you're going to say and what it's going to mean. — T.C. Boyle

There are fears that Britain could be facing a double-dip recession, or worse still, a double-dip with misery sprinkles and fuck-where's-my-job-sauce. — Frankie Boyle

Asperger's doesn't define me. It's a condition that I have to live with and work through, but I feel more relaxed about myself. People will have a greater understanding of who I am and why I do the things I do. — Susan Boyle

The important thing is that the President be saved from his friends. Bill Hassett urged Truman to rid himself of Boyle without delay. "Your friends will destroy you," Hassett pleaded. "It's all right, Bill," Truman said, as if trying to calm a child. "It's all right." Truman — David McCullough

I think that's the key [of communication] - to not use one method of communication for all people. — Mark Boyle

Everybody knows Aaron Sorkin's scripts. There's a huge amount of lines. There's a huge amount of interchange. You gotta do a lot of learning to be able to get it up to pace. — Danny Boyle

Martha had come up with the nickname Godbee by accident when she was younger than Lucy. Dorothy Boyle had been referred to as Grandma Boyle or Grandma B, for short, to distinguish her from Martha's other grandmother, Anne Hubbard. As a toddler, Martha couldn't pronounce Grandma B correctly, or had misheard it, and had, for as long as she could remember, called her favorite grandmother Godbee. For some reason, it had caught on. Not only with everyone in Martha's family, but with some of Godbee's friends and neighbors, too. — Kevin Henkes

Not only does God think we're firme, it is God's joy to have us marinate in that. — Gregory J. Boyle

Normally, I'm a very controlling director. Directors ARE controlling. It's part of the job, but there's various degrees of it and the constructs I normally work on are very controlling constructs. — Danny Boyle

I look upon a good physician, not so properly as a servant to nature, as one, that is a counsellor and friendly assistant, who, in his patient's body, furthers those motions and other things, that he judges conducive to the welfare and recovery of it; but as to those, that he perceives likely to be hurtful, either by increasing the disease, or otherwise endangering the patient, he thinks it is his part to oppose or hinder, though nature do manifestly enough seem to endeavour the exercising or carrying on those hurtful motions. — Robert Boyle

Originally I'm a big pop-music aficionado, that's my love. — Danny Boyle