Charade Quotes & Sayings

The time has come to end this charade. The debts are unaffordable. If they won't cancel the debts I would suggest obstruction; you do it yourselves. Africa should say: 'thank you very much but we need this money to meet the needs of children who are dying right now so we will put the debt servicing payments into urgent social investment in health, education, drinking water, control of AIDS and other needs.' — Jeffrey Sachs

I found it hugely insulting that people believed I'd go so far out of my way - living with Playmates, vacationing with actresses, showing up at nightclubs - to act out a lifestyle that would amount to a charade. If I was gay, I'd be gay all the way. — Mike Piazza

Jem's knees gave out, and he sank to the trunk at the foot of his bed, still playing. He played Will breathing the name Cecily, and he played himself watching the glint of his own ring on Tessa's hand on the train from York, knowing it was all a charade, knowing, too, that he wished that it wasn't. He played the sorrow in Tessa's eyes when she had come into the music room after Will had told her she would never have children. Unforgivable, that, what a thing to do, and yet Jem had forgiven him. Love was forgiveness, he had always believed that, and the things that Will did, he did out of some bottomless well of pain. Jem did not know the source of that pain, but he knew it existed and was real, knew it as he knew of the inevitability of his own death, knew it as he knew that he had fallen in love with Tessa Gray and that there was nothing he or anyone else could do about it. — Cassandra Clare

People sometimes act as though owning books you haven't read constitutes a charade or pretense, but for me, there's a lovely mystery and pregnancy about a book that hasn't given itself over to you yet--sometimes I'm the most inspired by imagining what the contents of an unread book might be. ~ Jonathan Lethem, author of The Fortress of Solitude — Leah Price

Marketers are making retirement respectable. Instead of being the beginning of the end, it sounds like Nirvana-do what you want without any responsibilities. The boomers think that they're 16. Marketers try to keep the charade going. Retirement will look so good, others are going to be jealous. — Jerry Della Femina

This ceremony of approval was a charade - everything had been decided before we got here - and as with all charades it was wanly ebullient, necessary, and thin. — Lorrie Moore

The obvious and fair solution to the housework problem is to let men do the housework for, say, the next six thousand years, to even things up. The trouble is that men, over the years, have developed an inflated notion of the importance of everything they do, so that before long they would turn housework into just as much of a charade as business is now. They would hire secretaries and buy computers and fly off to housework conferences in Bermuda, but they'd never clean anything. — Dave Barry

I have this theory that, depending on your attitude, your life doesn't have to become this ridiculous charade that it seems so many people end up living. — Christian Bale

Older women can afford to agree that femininity is a charade, a matter of colored hair, ecru lace and whalebones, the kind of slap and tat that transvestites are in love with, and no more. — Germaine Greer

He's been looking at my file. So the question has to be right there on the tip of his tongue right about now, waiting to be spoken. But he keeps up the 'act professional' charade, makes it feel like he sees this kind of thing all the time, but in reality he's having a little fun with it. I'm the story he's going to tell at a bar after making my name anonymous. I'm the case study that's going to become dinner conversation when he takes some rich bitch out next week. He's going to do it to make himself look well-balanced, prove how normal he is in a world full of weirdoes. In short, he's going to look 'normal' at my expense. — Cyma Rizwaan Khan

Your heart like a hawk-mouth in the sun, your heart like a ship on an atoll, your heart like a compass needle driven mad by a little piece of lead, like washing drying in the wind, like a whining of horses, like seed thrown to the birds, like an evening paper one has finished reading! Your heart is a charade that the whole world has guessed. — Louis Aragon

Before our "company" set off, at a wink from the officer, Plumpie stood up and proposed a search. I could see that some of the others thought she was wasting our time, but our company commander cheerfully seconded her proposal. He suggested we search him first. A boy was called to do this, and found a big bunch of keys on him. Our commander acted as though he had been genuinely careless, and gave Plumpie a victorious smile. The rest of us searched each other. This roundabout way of doing things reflected a Maoist practice: things had to look as though they were the wish of the people, rather than commands from above. Hypocrisy and playacting were taken for granted. — Jung Chang

Lila had discovered that the hardest part of her charade was pretending that everything was old hat when it was all so new, being forced to feign the kind of nonchalance that only comes from a lifetime of knowing and taking for granted. Lila was a quick study, and she knew how to keep up a front; but behind the mask of disinterest, she took in everything. She was a sponge, soaking up the words and customs, training herself to see something once and be able to pretend she'd seen it a dozen - a hundred - times before. — V.E Schwab

But he was sick of this charade. Sick of watching people lose a little more of their humanity each day, and sick to death of seeing people tortured in the name of God. What had happened to these people? — Brom

No, you will never been tamed, you are a monster, the eternal wild one. I often wonder where you came from, only someone with something to hide has such a cloudy beginnings. Who are you? Or more importantly who were you? There is only the odd bits that are known about you and nothing is set in stone. Do you even know the real you behind the charade? The fact that you are aroused by virginity, is a worrying fascination. I would not be surprised if the person who turned you realised what a monster he'd created. They were not called Frankenstein by any chance? Maybe you are a creature of many parts? Did you destroy your creator as well in a fit of rage? Is that why your are always looking for your virgin bride? Only you take beautiful swans and turn them into ugly ducklings. You will never return to that life that you give up. Stop trying to recreate them. — Beverley Price

I guard my existence, sheltered by distance. Hidden and masked I parade, everyone oblivious to the grand charade. — Tina J. Richardson

For as long as men and women have talked about war, they have talked about it in terms of right and wrong. And for almost as long, some among them have derided such talk, called it a charade, insisted that war lies beyond (or beneath) moral judgment. War is a world apart, where life itself is at stake, where human nature is reduced to its elemental forms, where self-interest and necessity prevail. Here men and women do what they must to save themselves and their communities, and morality and law have no place. Inter arma silent leges: in time of war the law is silent. — Michael Walzer

If you like being cuffed, I have no problem accommodating you, baby." "Actually," she returned, drawing the word out, "I was thinking I would cuff you." She held her breath. Any minute now, he'd scoff at her request and this charade would be over. Funny, she wasn't quite as ready to walk away as she had been moments ago. In fact, the thought of Brent's big body, restrained by handcuffs, was surprisingly appealing. That fluttering in her stomach had graduated into a constant tug, confusing her further. "Done." Hayden hid her shock as Brent leaned close and spoke gruffly near her ear. "Be warned, though. If you take away the use of my hands, I'll only make up for it with my mouth. — Tessa Bailey

In our charade with ourselves we pretend that our war is not really war. We have changed the name of the War Department to the Defense Department and call a whole class of nuclear missiles Peace Keepers! — Jack Kornfield

I know a lie when I see one, Catwin - even from you, now. I didn't once, you know. I thought you incapable of lying to me; I was wrong. You didn't know how big a mistake you made, when you deceived me for Miriel's little charade. Because until I discovered your lies, I did not know what it was that I was seeing in you. Now, I do. I know when you lie to me, and I will find out your secrets. — Moira Katson

I can't think about that, or Jackson's goal. I have my own part in this charade. — Melissa West

Some women, it seemed, were entirely without guile and bestowed their affections with hardly a moment's conscious thought. Others set out to implement a campaign of military thoroughness, with branched contingency trees and fallback positions, all to 'catch' a desirable man. The word 'desirable' was the giveaway, she thought. The poor jerk wasn't actually desired, only 'desirable' - a plausible object of desire in the opinion of those others on whose account this whole sorry charade was performed. Most women, she thought, were somewhere in the middle, seeking to reconcile their passions with their perceived long-term advantage. — Carl Sagan

Only when the little charade was nearly complete did Frances understand what it was all about. The spot at which Lilian had been grasping lay just above her heart. She had been drawing an imaginary stake from it. — Sarah Waters

I used to think all that game playing was par for the course and even kind of exciting. It just felt logical to pursue a boy the same way I applied to college - by expending exorbitant time and energy showing what a great catch I am and what a perfect match we'd be, so that after a lengthy waiting period I might get accepted. But now the idea of reliving any version of that charade seems like hell. — Daria Snadowsky

We allowed you a charade of trivial freedoms in order to avoid making those impositions on you that are in the end both the training ground and proving ground for true independence. We pronounced you strong when you were still weak in order to avoid taking part in the long, slow, slogging effort that is the only route to genuine maturity of mind and feeling. Thus, it was no small anomaly of your growing up that while you were the most indulged generation, you were also in many ways the most abandoned to your own meager devices by those into whose safe-keeping you had been given. — Midge Decter

There is nothing to say because I know everything about him. I raised him. I know what's a charade, and I know what's not a charade. I'll leave it at that. — Shaquille O'Neal

you're just pissed you liked it — Nyrae Dawn

CHARADE PARADE
A 'Special Day' once a year creates an excuse for neglect on the other 365 days for mothers, fathers & veterans — Kamil Ali

She had not always been in my life, but life before her seemed like a charade. — Matt Abrams

Perfect is an illusion, one that was created to maintain the status quo. The Six Sigma charade is largely about hiding from change, because change is never perfect. Change means reinvention, and until something is reinvented, we have no idea what the spec is. — Seth Godin

Little girl," Cain begins, moving in close and speaking deliberately. "I know exactly what I want, but as long as you insist on continuing this charade, I will not claim you as mine again until you beg to hear those words from me." I stare at him, stunned at how the same cocksure attitude that floods my mind with contempt floods my body with excitement as he leans back, a satisfied smirk on his face.
"I don't beg," I hiss.
"Not yet," is all he says. — Lilly Black

So Santa Claus is bogus but Grim Reapers are the genuine article. What does that say about the world? — Mindee Arnett

It might sound a paradoxical thing to say
for surely never has a generation of children occupied more sheer hours of parental time
but the truth is that we neglected you. We allowed you a charade of trivial freedoms ... — Midge Decter

His gaze slid down her frame, pissed with her continued charade and frustrated, not knowing how to break through the barriers that had protected her for so long. Maybe he'd never break through. Maybe she'd never really open up or let him close. "Don't judge her with your snobbery and prejudice. That's not who she is. And deep down, it's not who you are either. — Toni Anderson

Our creationist detractors charge that evolution is an unproved and unprovable charade-a secular religion masquerading as science. They claim, above all, that evolution generates no predictions, never exposes itself to test, and therefore stands as dogma rather than disprovable science. This claim is nonsense. We make and test risky predictions all the time; our success is not dogma, but a highly probable indication of evolution's basic truth. — Stephen Jay Gould

Larkin found himself next to her now, his arm wrapped around her shoulders as if to comfort, though why he had no idea, for she seemed as calm as ever. Somehow, deep down, he knew that it was all a charade, a mask that she fitted in place as a means of protection. It wasn't easy for her to trust. — Chani Lynn Feener

I asked Shia: who is the guy that terrifies you the most? And he said Mads. So it was somebody we both really wanted to work with. He's intimidating, but has a really big heart and he's sexy. He's got this sexiness, even guys fall for him. He just penetrates everything-not literally. So we needed a brokenhearted thug that could really give us the heartache. And going between the violence and viciousness and the complete softness without making it too much. A lot of those characters can go into a charade, and I needed it to be genuine heartbrokenness and that's what he's great at doing. — Fredrik Bond

While Kalila didn't quite know what she wanted, she knew what she didn't want. She didn't want to live a charade. She didn't want a marriage of convenience where you were together but alone. — Christian F. Burton

My point here is to insist that the rich should pay their way, and that they can easily afford to do so. All of the angst of canceling vital government programs to close the deficit is a charade put on by the rich for the rich. With a fair tax structure and a just contribution of the rich to the rest of society, we can afford a truly civilized America. Let — Jeffrey D. Sachs

In Plato's Republic, Socrates expresses great fear about democracy because it is, in his mind, synonymous with freedom. The result is tyranny. But modern times have brought us a different understanding of democracy as an ideal. It is how to give the appearance of democracy yet deny it in practice, ensuring that democracy in its false form gives consent by the people to a small group, the oligarchs. This is accomplished through a combination of the people's silence and a rigged system that changes a working democracy of public participation and deliberation to a charade. — Noam Chomsky

The Dutch at close proximity looked much like Americans, apart from their peculiar uniforms, and so it was their uniforms I fired at, half convinced that I was killing, not human beings, but enemy costumes, which had borne their contents here from a distant land; and if some living man suffered for his enslavement to the uniform, or was penetrated by the bullets aimed at it well, that was unavoidable, and the fault couldn't be placed at my feet. The private charade was not equivalent to Courage, but it enabled a Callousness that served a similar purpose. — Robert Charles Wilson

I have a lot of favorite films. I tend to love the silliness of 'Bringing Up Baby.' 'Charade' is fantastic. 'His Girl Friday,' the banter in that, that alone made me want to be a writer. — Jennifer Grant

Stars flicker above, points of bright ice in a dark river. I pull a heavy sheepskin around my legs and stretch my feet toward the fire. Despite the cold, Liam plays his flute, the sound whistling through the night. Soon my eyes are heavy, my head nodding.I open my eyes at the deep melodious baritone of Salvius's voice telling a tale. Liam's flute is silent now. I have heard Salvius tell many tales on market days; he is known for his memory of wandering minstrels and mummers who visit us at Whitsunday and through Midsummer. Salvius is a mockingbird: he can give a fair charade of the rhythmic tones of any wandering bard or any noble of the Royal Court.In this darkness, his eyes catch the light like a cat in the night. — Ned Hayes

You have been given a great power. But no power comes without a price. That is how magic works. How the universe works. All things kept in balance. — Mindee Arnett

What a fucking charade.
Happy. That shit isn't in our cards. - Duke — Stephanie Witter

It is a moment that has no meaning. It is as if the tired charade of human life with its great pursuits and history and wounds and deep convictions has collapsed, and the world has been suddenly revealed as a place that has no point, that does not need the hypothesis of meaning to explain its existence. — Manu Joseph

Plot these days is anti-intellectual and verboten, the mark of the Philistine, the huckster with a pen. There mustn't be too much story and that should be fog-bound and shrouded in heavy symbolism, including the phallic, like a sort of covoluted charade. Symbolism now carries the day, it's the one true ladder of literary heaven. — Robert Traver

...and justice itself became a commodity, mutable in imbalance. Truth was lost, a chimera reshaped to match agenda, prejudices, thus cosigning the entire political process to a mummer's charade of false indignation, hypocritical posturing and a perverse contempt for the commonry. Once subsumed, ideals and the honor created by their avowal can never be regained, except by outright, unconstrained rejection, invariably instigated by the commonry, at the juncture of one particular moment of such brazen injustice that revolution becomes the only reasonable response. — Steven Erikson

We may be a little broken these days but I wouldn't trade it for anything. — Mindee Arnett

She's the one most likely to call bullshit on even perfunctory get-togethers, unhappy with the charade of being friends when we aren't actually anymore. — Mindy McGinnis

As Hamlet said to Ophelia, "God has given you one face, and you make yourself another." The battle between these two halves of identity...Who we are and who we pretend to be, is unwinnable. "Just as there are two sides to every story, there are two sides to every person. One that we reveal to the world and another we keep hidden inside. A duality governed by the balance of light and darkness, within each of us is the capacity for both good and evil. But those who are able to blur the moral dividing line hold the true power. — Emily Thorne

Why do you continue your... charade? Your current position would seem to be a good one for revealing the truth'.
'A few people know, sir. Bobby, Jane, some of the Leatherbacks. For the rest... it just seems easier to keep things as they are.' Winter thought of Novus and his tirade. 'It would be one thing if I had just joined up, but it's been so long. People might be upset that they'd been fooled. And...'
Janus raised an eyebrow. Winter hesitated.
'It's all right for the Girl's Own,' she said. 'They joined up because Vordan needs them, and when the war's over they'll go home. I... I haven't anywhere to go.' She tugged the collar of her uniform. 'This is who I am now, for better or worse. This is my home. After the war, maybe it will be all right for a woman to keep this on, but... maybe not.'
Winter found her throat getting thick. She'd never put it that way before, never even thought it so bluntly. This is my home. — Django Wexler

You are your own boss. No one else. — Mindee Arnett

I can't lose her. Please, God, don't let me lose her. I need her. I'll do anything. We'll end this charade, we'll go back to being purely just friends. Just don't take her away from me tonight. — S.C. Stephens

Nobody gives way to anybody. Everyone just angles, points, dives directly toward his destination, pretending it is an all-or-nothing gamble. People glare at one another and fight for maneuvering space. All parties are equally determined to get the right-of-way
insist on it. They swerve away at the last possible moment, giving scant inches to spare. The victor goes forwards, no time for a victory grin, already engaging in another contest of will. Saigon traffic is Vietnamese life, a continuous charade of posturing, bluffing, fast moves, tenacity and surrenders. — Andrew X. Pham

Good Being is knowing who in fact we are; and in order to know who in fact we are, we must first know, moment by moment, who we think we are and what this bad habit of thought compels us to feel and do. A moment of clear and complete knowledge of what we think we are, but in fact are not, puts a stop, for a moment, to the Manichean charade. If we renew, until they become a continuity, these moments of the knowledge of what we are not, we may find ourselves, all of a sudden, knowing who in fact we are. — Aldous Huxley

The charade of politics is to make voters think that the personal narrative of the candidate affects the operation of the corporate state. It doesn't really matter on the fundamental issues whether the President is Republican or Democratic. — Chris Hedges

Kids do have to learn that life is a humiliating charade of endless disappointment and tragedy ultimately culminating in pain, decay, and death. My parents used to sing me to sleep with that one. — Samantha Bee

Whenever a homeless person speaks to me in the USA, I always assume that I am speaking to a police officer and play along with the suspected charade. — Steven Magee

Lies hold civilization together. If people ever seriously begin telling each other what they really think, there'd be no peace. Good-bye to tact. Good-bye to being polite. Good-bye to showing tolerance for other people's buffooneries. The fact that we claim to admire Truth is probably the biggest lie of all. But that's part of the charade, part of what makes us human, and we do not even think about it. In effect, we lie to ourselves. Lies are only despicable when they betray a trust. — Jack McDevitt

It's all society is, the repressed sex drives of men, the objectification of women, their paranoia, the posturing, the macho stances, the beauty standard, it's all just one charade masking a never ending hard on. — Trevor D. Richardson

Romance novels are all about desire and happily-ever-after, but happily-ever-after doesn't come from desire - at least not the kind portrayed in pulp romances. Real love is not to desire a person but to desire their happiness - sometimes even at the expense of our own happiness. Real love is to expand our own capacity for tolerance and caring, to actively seek another's well-being. All else is simply a charade of self-interest. — Richard Paul Evans

Isn't beer the holy libation of sincerity? the potion that dispels all hypocrisy, any charade of fine manners? the drink that does nothing worse than incite its fans to urinate in all innocence, to gain weight in all frankness? — Milan Kundera

As long as we avoided the real subject, the spell could not be broken. We both slipped naturally into this kind of banter, and it became all the more powerful because neither of us abandoned the charade. We knew what we were doing, but at the same time we pretended not to. — Paul Auster

As the cards fluttered to earth, as everyone's hand was revealed as worthless, as every point won was shown to be a pointless charade, she would tell them how wonderful this other man was, and how if she didn't see him for another thirty years she would still love him, how she would still love him if he was dead until she was dead too. But instead she watched as Harry Robertson played the right bower, and he and Keith, who always played as partners, won the hand. — Richard Flanagan

I made a big show of catching invisible words in my hands and putting them in my mouth and chewing on them. I knew my word-catching charade wasn't the best way to make a fast friend at Stoneberry Elementary School. But it was the only way I could think of to make my sister feel better. And I think if you're lucky, a sister is the same as a friend, but better. A sister is like a super-forever-infinity friend. — Natalie Lloyd

The advantage of the internet is that it has taken away the charade of politics. China has heard of democracy and people know about certain concepts they wouldn't have previously. — Marilyn Manson

Before she could ponder what on earth he meant or come up with a proper response, he took their charade a step further.

He kissed her. — J.M. Stewart

"In one way or another, this is the oldest story in America: the struggle to determine whether "we, the people" is a spiritual idea embedded in a political reality - one nation, indivisible - or merely a charade masquerading as piety and manipulated by the powerful and privileged to sustain their own way of life at the expense of others." — Bill Moyers

What does a person need - really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in - and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That's all - in the material sense. And we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention from the sheer idiocy of the charade. The years thunder by. — Sterling Hayden

The future is never fixed, but always in flux until the moment it meets with the present. — Mindee Arnett

Over time, the persona I assumed in her presence came to supplant my true self. It must have been then I first came to realize that for most people life was not a joy to be embraced with a full heart but a miserable charade to be endured with a false smile, a narrow path of lies, punishment, and repression. — Orhan Pamuk

All the political angst and moral melodrama about getting 'the rich' to pay 'their fair share' is part of a big charade. This is not about economics, it is about politics. — Thomas Sowell

The danger of education, I have found, is that it so easily confuses means with ends. Worse than that, it quite easily forgets both and devotes itself merely to the mass production of uneducated gradtuates - people literaly unfit for anything except to take part in an elaborate and completely artificial charade which they and their contemporaries have conspired to call "life". — Thomas Merton

I hated my part in the charade of murder and horror. My efforts were contributing to the deaths, to the burning alive of children - especially the children. The photographs of young Vietnamese children burned by napalm destroyed me. — Ralph McGehee

Real love is to expand our own capacity for tolerance and caring, to actively seek another's well-being. All else is simply a charade of self-interest. Zeke — Richard Paul Evans

Nope, there wasn't any getting out of this. Real first name meant business. — Mindee Arnett