Clever But Funny Quotes & Sayings

Please don't arrest me."
"Listen to me, I'm not going to arrest you, ok? I'm not a cop."
"Are you sure?"
"Am I sure I'm not a cop? yes, I'm sure."
"You could be undercover. — Derek Landy

Skul-man!' he exclaimed as he rushed forward to shake his hand. 'Last I heard you were trapped on a dead world overrun by evil trans-dimensional superfiends!'
Skulduggery nodded. 'Just got back. — Derek Landy

I don't mind people putting us down, because if everybody really liked us, it would be a bore. You've got to have people putting you down. It doesn't give any edge to it if everybody just falls flat on their face saying, 'You're great.' We enjoy some of the criticisms as well, they're quite funny; some of the clever criticisms, not the ones that don't know anything, but some of the clever ones are quite fun. — John Lennon

You can make fun of yourself and people will laugh at you. If you're smart, you'll end up as a comedian. If you're not, you'll end up as a clown. — Ljupka Cvetanova

How the mighty have fallen," he said, looking down on Aten. Ard-Greimne was short and incredibly sensitive about his height. He always wore shoes with lifts in them. When Aten didn't respond, he tried again. "I said, how the mighty - "
"It wasn't funny or even clever the first time you said it," Aten said. "Nor is it original. — Michael Scott

For sheer sexiness, a man must be beautiful. Funny. yes. Clever, no. — Jilly Cooper

People forget how outcast 'They Might Be Giants' can be. They have a reputation for writing really deft, funny, clever melodies, and they also make a lot of music for kids, which is terrific, but when you see them in concert, they can rock the house. — John Hodgman

As it 'appens, I am Arthur's right-hand man," said Suzy. "Or left-hand girl, I can't remember where I stood last time. Anyhow, me and Arthur is like two fingers of a gauntlet. Or at least the thumb and the little finger. I mean, I'm his top General, and all. So if I say you're in, you're in. — Garth Nix

You said not to do anything that might accidentally contribute to the apocalypse," Magnus said. "I know you were joking. But it's less funny when I can't rid myself of the feeling that the apocalypse is coming, somehow. Valentine Morgenstern nearly wiped out the Shadowhunters, and his son is twice as clever and six times as evil. And he will not come alone. He has help, from demons greater than my father, from others - — Cassandra Clare

It's not so bad."
Melancholia looked at her. "You're lying."
"I'll get used to it. So will you."
"I ... I don't think I'll be able to."
"I'll be there to help when you need it."
"But I hate you."
Valkyrie smiled. "No you don't."
"No, I do. I want to kill you and stuff."
"We actually became friends in those caves."
"That's not what happened, " said Melancholia.
"We're pals. We're buddies."
"If my wrists weren't in shackles, my hands would be round your throat."
"You want to hug my throat because we're friends. — Derek Landy

I got tired of books where the boy is a bit thick and the girl's very clever. Why does it have to such an opposition? Why can't they be like the girls and boys that I know personally, who are equally funny and equally cross? Who get things equally wrong and are equally brave? And make the same mistakes? — Patrick Ness

Girls get their boobs and forget they were ever so gutsy and smart. Boys, too, can display their own brand of clever and funny behavior, but let them get that first erection and they go complete moron for the next sixty years. For both genders, adolescence occurs as a kind of Ice Age of Dumbness. — Chuck Palahniuk

The boarding school memoir or novel is an enduring literary subgenre, from 1950s classics such as The Catcher in the Rye to Curtis Sittenfeld's Prep. Doust's recognisably Australian contribution to the genre draws on his own experiences in a West Australian boarding school in this clever, polished, detail-rich debut novel. From the opening pages, the reader is wholly transported into the head of Jack Muir, a sensitive, sharp-eyed boy from small-town WA who is constantly measured (unfavourably) against his goldenboy brother. The distinctive, masterfully inhabited adolescent narrator recalls the narrator in darkly funny coming-of-age memoir Hoi Polloi (Craig Sherborne) - as does the juxtaposition of stark naivety and carefully mined knowingness.' - Bookseller+Publisher — Jon Doust

I'm going to photograph every single person to enter and leave this tattoo parlour."
Finbar rolled his eyes. "And they'll hate that, because people who get dragons drawn on their backs are normally so shy about other people noticing them. — Derek Landy

Quite a lot is a large amount but quite a few is also a large amount. — Teresa Monachino

Later, they also found a camp of outlaws who, when offered the chance to join the rebel ranks, unsheathed their daggers and threatened to cut the three into tiny, bloody pieces and eat them for dinner.
They too that as a firm no. — Morgan Rhodes

Why is abbreviation such a long word? — Teresa Monachino

You're impossible," she told him.
"Of course I am," he answered. "It's part of my charm. — David Eddings

Clever is the eunuch version of funny. — George Meyer

My wife was saying to me just the other day how she's noticed a spring in my step lately. That was because I thought you were gone forever.'
'I missed you too, Thurid. — Derek Landy

This person called up and said, You've got to come and take this seminar. It will completely change your life in just one weekend. And I said, Well, I don't want to completely change my life this weekend. I've got a lot of things to do on Monday. — Rick Fields

It is quite funny really when you think that probably I would have married him if he'd been at all clever about it. But instead of putting it to me as a sensible business proposition he would drag in all this talk about love the whole time, and I simply can't bear those showerings of sentimentality. Otherwise I should most likely have married him ages ago. — Nancy Mitford

He things we think he's a double agent, working for them but secretly working for us. He doesn't know we know he's a triple agent, working for them but secretly working for us but really he's secretly working for them. Dexter, how's your brain?"
"Hurting. — Derek Landy

Civilization begins with distillation — William Faulkner

They're not going to arrest you,' Skulduggery said as they walked through the door. 'They might glare at you and say angry words, but they won't arrest you. Well, they might arrest you. There's a good chance they will. But the important thing is that I've done nothing wrong.'
'For once. — Derek Landy

Yeah, sure. You know I can't stand the sight of blood, right?"
"Said no one ever while dating a vampire," he quipped
"Very clever. Ten points to Gryffindor. — Kristi Cook

If you give the audience what they expect, they'll be bored. There are no rules: You do what you want while respecting the boundaries. You don't poke people in the eye; you do things they haven't seen before and make it accessible, funny and clever. — Matthew Vaughn

There are many other little refinements too, Mr. Bohlen. You'll see them all when you study the plans carefully. For example, there's a trick that nearly every writer uses, of inserting at least one long, obscure word into each story. This makes the reader think that the man is very wise and clever. So I have the machine do the same thing. There'll be a whole stack of long words stored away just for this purpose."
Where?"
In the 'word-memory' section," he said, epexegetically. — Roald Dahl

More than his exterior hit me. I felt warm and safe just being with him. He brought comfort after my terrible day. So often with other people I felt a need to be center of attention, to be funny and always have something clever to say. It was a habit I needed to shake. But with him I never felt like I had to be anything more than what I already was. I didn't have to entertain him or think up jokes or even flirt. It was enough to just be together, to be so completely comfortable in each other's presence - we lost all sense of self-consciousness. — Richelle Mead

I'm not a boy-writer, I've never been. I wanted to be a boy-writer when I was young, and I think that held me back. I wanted to be very clever, and funny, but I'm not very clever and not terribly funny. I've finally accepted my limits, and I do what I can do. — Paul Auster

Sarah Jane Smith was everybody's hero when I was younger, and as brave and funny and brilliant as people only ever are in stories. But many years later, when I met the real Sarah Jane - Lis Sladen herself - she was exactly as any child ever have wanted her to be. Kind and gentle and clever; and a ferociously talented actress, of course, but in that perfectly English unassuming way. — Steven Moffat

Before I met your father I thought that love and peace would change the whole world, but looking into your eyes, I knew all I had to do was let you be whoever it was that you wanted to be, and to love you, and that would be the best and closest thing I could ever do to change the world for the better.
"You are going to be brilliant," I told you. "You are going to be clever, and funny. Brave and strong. You're going to be a feminist, and a peace campaigner and a dancer. And one day you are going to be a mother yourself. You are going to fall in love and have adventures and do things I can't even imagine. You, little Claire Armstrong, you are going to be the most wonderful woman, and you are going to have the most amazing life: a life that no one will ever forget. — Jojo Moyes

If you were smart," Genghis said, "you would have borrowed the silverware of one of your friends."
"We never thought of that," Klaus said. When one is forced to tell atrocious lies, one often feels a guilty flutter in one's stomach, and Klaus felt such a flutter now. "You certainly are an intelligent man."
"Not only am I intelligent," Genghis agreed, "but I'm also very smart. — Lemony Snicket

To ugly ducklings everywhere,
Don't worry about those fluffy yellow morons:
They'll never get to be swans — Zoe Marriott

I'd say," the Ranger answered after a few seconds' deliberation, "that he'll be heading south now that he has the chance. Back into Araluen."
"How do you know that?" Horace asked. He was always impressed at the two Rangers' ability to read a situation and come up with the correct answer to a problem. Sometimes, he thought, they almost seemed to have divine guidance.
"I'm guessing," Halt told him. — John Flanagan

A lot of the tabloid stories are written so well, they're very clever and very funny. But you have to focus on what's really important and not read them - don't dive into it and don't get caught up in it. — Calista Flockhart

Funny, clever and exciting!!! — Rick Riordan

He forced himself forward trying to seem innocent without acting like someone who was guilty who was trying to act innocent. — James Dashner

I think that Obama is very cool. And I think he's clever, and I think he can be witty. But I don't think he's funny in either the way that Reagan was funny - or John McCain and Dick Cheney are both funny in that ruthless, kind of mean way. — Mo Rocca

Richard [Griffiths] was by my side during two of the most important moments of my career. In August 2000, before official production had even begun on Potter, we filmed a shot outside the Dursleys', which was my first ever shot as Harry. I was nervous and he made me feel at ease. Seven years later, we embarked on 'Equus' together. It was my first time doing a play but, terrified as I was, his encouragement, tutelage and humor made it a joy. In fact, any room he walked into was made twice as funny and twice as clever just by his presence. — Daniel Radcliffe

When I was a kid watching comedians on TV and listening to their records they were the only ones that could make it all seem okay. They seemed to cut through the bullshit and disarm fears and horror by being clever and funny. I don't think I could have survived my childhood without watching stand-up comics. When I started doing comedy I didn't understand show business. I just wanted to be a comedian. Now, after twenty-five years of doing stand-up and the last two years of having long conversations with over two hundred comics I can honestly say they are some of the most thoughtful, philosophical, open-minded, sensitive, insightful, talented, self-centred, neurotic, compulsive, angry, fucked-up, sweet, creative people in the world. — Marc Maron

Graham's life is as tense as an overstretched simile. — Zane Stumpo

Teenagers are extremely funny, and extremely clever and intellectually curious. But they're also willing to ask questions about the meaning of life without disguising them around irony, and ask questions about what are our responsibilities to other people without having to couch it in irony. — John Green

Humor is important. If you're going to tell any sort of realistic story, you're going to have to have humor in it, because people are funny. Clever people especially. — Patrick Rothfuss

I have always been very fond of them (drama critics) ... I think it is so frightfully clever of them to go night after night to the theatre and know so little about it. — Noel Coward

I used to see dolphins as cute,
Smart and funny sea animals.
I know now that they're astute,
Divine beings, clever mammals. — Ana Claudia Antunes

My mother was a terrific force in my life. Wartime-generation woman, hadn't gone to university but should have done. Was very funny, very verbal, very clever, very witty. — Ian Hislop

The Kit Kat candy bar has the name Kit Kat imprinted into the chocolate. That robs you of chocolate! That's a clever chocolate-saving technique. — Mitch Hedberg

So, deadpan I think just means not acknowledging for one second that you think that this is funny and clever. — Patrick Warburton

Novels are not about expressing yourself, they're about something beautiful, funny, clever and organic. Self-expression? Go and ring a bell in a yard if you want to express yourself. — Zadie Smith

For one thing, everyone there is so clever. Do they think me dull?
Perhaps I should assure them that our goats enjoyed listening to me for hours on end. I am certain their bleats meant "Do go on, Miri, darling. You are immensely entertaining."
Your immensely entertaining sister,
Miri — Shannon Hale

I've just finished reading some of my early papers, and you know, when I'd finished I said to myself, 'Rutherford, my boy, you used to be a damned clever fellow.' (1911) — Ernest Rutherford

When she walked by the two officers, they didn't recognize her.
"Have you seen the luscious bonbon with the golden braids?"
She grinned up at them with such impish mischief that they almost forgot their quest for the singer. "She is with her lover," Hannah said. "But she can always handle one or two more." She winked at them. "Go there, through that door."
She made her escape while the uniformed hobbledehoys gawked and gaped and finally burst into the dressing room where Franz, the three-hundred-pound juggling strongman, was adjusting his loincloth.
"I ought not do it," Hannah said aloud to herself as chaos erupted behind her. "I just can't seem to help myself. it is a shame, really. — Laura L. Sullivan

Would you like me to grovel with gratitude for bringing me here, High Lord?"
"Ah. The Suriel told you nothing important, did it?"
That smile of his sparked something bold in my chest. "He also said that you liked being brushed, and if I'm a clever girl, I might train you with treats."
Tamlin tipped his head to the sky and roared with laughter. Despite myself, I let out a quiet laugh.
"I might die of surprise," Lucien said behind me. "You made a joke, Feyre."
I turned to look at him with a cool smile. "You don't want to know what the Suriel said about you." I flicked my brows up, and Lucien lifted his hands in defeat.
"I'd pay good money to hear what the Suriel thinks of Lucien," Tamlin said.
A cork popped, followed by the sounds of Lucien chugging the bottle's contents and chuckling with a muttered, "Brushed. — Sarah J. Maas

Nothing so fortifies a friendship as a belief on the part of one friend that he is superior to the other. — Honore De Balzac

I had a dream about you. I licked your cone of ice cream. It was envelope flavored. — Melody Sohayegh

Ed, I see you're out drinking again. What's the occasion? I was sober. — Ed Byrne

Alcoholic: anybody who drinks more than I do. — W.C. Fields

In the end, the thing that really stays with you is not that you were clever enough to connect a sketch to another sketch, but what really sticks with you is when you just have an incredible moment happen, or execute a really funny idea. — Bob Odenkirk

A lot of modern comedies are difficult to watch too, because they're so ironic and so detached and so quote-unquote clever. They kind of keep you at arm's length. They can be really funny, but they're not really nourishing. — Ty Burrell

I showed what I can do with butter, right? Eighty-five percent increase in sales. I'm very proud of them Country Life ads. They were funny and clever and classy like the Toblerone ads I grew up with. — John Lydon

All my life I've wanted, just once, to say something clever without losing my train of thought — Robert Breault

Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them. — Bertrand Russell

You promise?"
"I cross the place where my heart used to be and wish to be even more deader than I am now. — Derek Landy

I expect the world from you, as I should, because you're amazing and talented and funny and sweet. You're sexy as hell and clever and smart and capable of so many things. So yeah. I expect a hell of a lot from you. And I also expect that you can be successful in managing your OCD. I'm proud of you, Bailey. — S. Walden

You are very clever," said the old man shyly. "I would like to eat your brains, one day."
For some reason the books of etiquette that Daphne's grandmother had forced on her didn't quite deal with this. Of course, silly people would say to babies, "You're so sweet I could gobble you all up!" but that sort of nonsense seemed less funny when it was said by a man in war paint who owned more than one skull. Daphne, cursed with good manners, settled for "It's very kind of you to say so. — Terry Pratchett

This isn't the first time I've used this, and the test subject showed no signs of impaired cognitive ability."
"Who was the test subject?" asked Aurora.
"I test everything out on myself before taking it into the field."
She stared at him. "You zapped your own brain?"
"And it didn't do me any harm apart from the dizziness and the vomiting spells and the weirdly persistent ringing in my ears. Also the blackouts and the mood swings and the creeping paranoia. Apart from that, zero side effects, if you don't count the numb fingertips. Which I don't. — Derek Landy

I got into trouble a lot in school. They say you're a disturbance in class. You're a distraction, they're moving you around. You never really get rewarded in class for being funny. You're a disturbance. But the funny kid is often witty and clever and quick ... they finally get a chance to express themselves when they get out of school. — Godfrey

If you're going to take a jab at someone, you should at least have a bit more of a personal relationship with them. I feel like you can be funny and clever, as opposed to just outright vile. — Harland Williams

Men Wanted for Dangerous Expedition: Low Wages for Long Hours of Arduous Labour under Brutal Conditions; Months of Continual Darkness and Extreme Cold; Great Risk to Life and Limb from Disease, Accidents and Other Hazards; Small Chance of Fame in Case of Success. — Ernest Shackleton

You Cannot Live as I Have Lived and Not End Up Like This: The Thoroughly Disgraceful Life & Times of Willie Donaldson. — Jay Nordlinger

One ought not to fall in love with someone by way of their writing. One must be especially careful if the writing is good, for then one assumes the writer is good, funny, clever, profound, sensitive, smart, wise, loving, and true. It is unfair to the writer and dangerous to the reader to hold the writer to the standards of his writing, for in his writing, the writer is his best self; in person, he is a person, and we all know what that means. — Jane Juska

I came across a man in Belgium once, a very famous detective, and he quite inflamed me. He was a marvellous little fellow. He used to say that all good detective work was a mere matter of method. My system is based on his - though of course I have progressed rather further. He was a funny little man, a great dandy, but wonderfully clever. — Agatha Christie

Our lips met hungrily, and his clever artistic hands wrapped around my hips. A sudden buzz from my regular cell phone startled me from the kissing.
"Don't," said Adrian, his eyes ablaze and breathing ragged.
"What if there's a crisis at school?" I asked. "What if Angeline 'accidentally' stole one of the campus buses and drove it into the library?"
"Why would she do that?"
"Are you saying she wouldn't?"
He sighed. "Go check it. — Richelle Mead

I think I have an inner confidence that my tastes are pretty simple, that what I find funny finds a wide audience. I'm not particularly intellectual or clever or minority-focused in my creative instincts. And I'm certainly not aware of suppressing more sophisticated ambitions. — Rowan Atkinson

Laura's problem was that she kept casting men in roles they weren't suited for. Like lovely Josh, casting him in the role of decent, kind house-husband, the perfect partner, the modern male, when - what was it that she'd actually loved about him, really? Laura tried to think, and couldn't come up with an answer. He was a great man - kind, funny, clever, hard working - but there was no way he was the man for her, she realised now. Why hadn't she seen it? — Harriet Evans

Thomas was sick of being accused of knowing things. — James Dashner

It was a hard name having growing up as a child. Some kids would call me names like "Birbiglebug" and "Birbibliography" and "Faggot". Some were more clever than others. — Mike Birbiglia

Comedians who are 22 years old can certainly be funny and clever, and be capable of telling jokes - but are they talking about their favorite TV shows, or a particular brand of shampoo? — Rob Delaney

The fact is I'm choosy, but mainly about a man's character. He has to be interesting, funny and clever. I don't even mind if he's not very good-looking. — Agyness Deyn

Noses run. Feet smell. — Teresa Monachino

I'd even had business cards made up reading, ABIGAIL COOPER, P.I. with teeny-weeny little letters underneath in parentheses spelling out PSYCHIC INTUITIVE. Most people think I'm trying to be clever. The truth is, I'm a chickenshit. — Victoria Laurie

I am Detective Inspector Me. This is my partner, Detective Her."
The traffic warden frowned. "Her?"
"Me," said Stephanie.
"Him?"
"Not me," said Skulduggery. "Her."
"Me," said Stephanie.
"You?" said the traffic warden.
"Yes," said Stephanie.
"I'm sorry, who are you?"
Stephanie looked at him. "I'm Her, he's Me. Got it? — Derek Landy

The biggest problem of all is that it's very difficult to tell my daughter, 'Swearing is not clever or funny,' because I earn a living by swearing. — Peter Capaldi

What a man misses mostly in heaven is company. — Mark Twain

I get tired of comedies where there are a bunch of funny guys and a beautiful woman who doesn't do anything funny. And I don't like books where there's a rough-and-tumble boy and a really clever, snotty girl. That's just not my experience with teenagers. — Patrick Ness