Risible Quotes & Sayings

Most cannibalism is not a primitive or even a bestial habit. It is artificial and even artistic; a sort of art for art's sake. Men do not do it because they do not think it horrible; but, on the contrary, because they do think it horrible ... It is by no means clear, so far as I know that the Eskimos ever indulged in human sacrifice. They were not civilised enough. — G.K. Chesterton

A thirst for gold, The beggar's vice, which can but overwhelm The meanest hearts. — Lord Byron

Every death diminishes us, but those that leave differences unresolved and things unsaid are the most painful of all. — Marcia Muller

Give the man of color an equal opportunity with the white, from the cradle to manhood, and from manhood to the grave, and you would discover the dignified statesman, the man of science, and the philosopher. — Maria W. Stewart

An actor entering through the door, you've got nothing. But if he enters through the window, you've got a situation. — Billy Wilder

There is a sort of light surrounding Abel, something pure and strong radiates from him no matter where he is or what he's doing. Sometimes Cain thinks he possesses a soul without shadows. That's what people want to be close to. But if so, it's not like a child's, for a child's soul is delicate, its flickering flame needs no more than the opening of a door onto the world to blow it out. Nothing can destroy Abel's light. In his presence one never feels wicked, only foolish. That darkness which in solitude can seem so powerful, occasionally even intoxicating, seems risible in his company. — Karl Ove Knausgard

The reciprocal civility of authors is one of the most risible scenes in the farce of life. — Samuel Johnson

Men have lost their reason in nothing so much as their religion, wherein stones and clouts make martyrs. — Thomas Browne

The crushing, pitiful, and frequently just plain risible pathos of an unsuccessful actor/performer's life is well charted. — Arabella Weir

I can never quite decide whether the anti- Columbus movement is merely risible or faintly sinister ... It is sinister, though, because it is an ignorant celebration of stasis and backwardness, with an unpleasant tinge of self-hatred. — Christopher Hitchens

Not he who has much is rich, but he who gives much. — Erich Fromm

In the 21st century, we don't need to march against size-zero models, risible pornography, lap-dancing clubs, and Botox. We don't need to riot or go on hunger strikes. There's no need to throw ourselves under a horse, or even a donkey. We just need to look it in the eye, squarely, for a minute, and then start laughing at it. — Caitlin Moran

risible. In the Community, none — Dean Koontz

(I)t is highly questionable whether when 'Europe speaks with one voice', as we are so often told it is doing, anyone is really listening. Europe's reputation as a serious player in international affairs is unenviable. It is a feeble giant who desperate attempts to be taken seriously are largely risible. It has a weak currency and a sluggish inflexible economy, still much reliant on hidden protectionism. It has a shrinking, ageing, population and, with the exception of Britain, rather unimpressive armed forces and, not excepting Britain, muddled diplomacy. — Margaret Thatcher

She shakes him; that is what she presumable does to other readers too. That is, presumably why, in the larger picture, she exists. What a strange reward for a lifetime of shaking people: to be conveyed to this town in Pennsylvania and given money! — J.M. Coetzee

The notion of our leaders as patrician ascetics of unassailable virtue is risible. — Nick Harkaway

King Arthur is profoundly stupid and inept.. then there's Clive Owen, rising above it all. Aloof yet watchful, the actor cultivates an inner stillness that is perfect for faintly ironic brooders. He neither distances himself from this risible material nor pulls out the stops and opens himself to ridicule. His King Arthur tells us little about Arthur, but much about protecting one's flank. The mark of a box-office king? — David Edelstein

Every attempt to understand this universe, whether by charting its motions, systematizing its products, or searching for its origins, is naturally vain and risible, and Pascal was making real fun of the science of his age. What he never grasped was that the real aim of science isn't to understand the world, but to close it up. — Karl Ove Knausgard

The reason they outperformed her was that they accepted each new "product" without trying to understand it. They got behind the new pitch wholeheartedly, even when it was risible and/or made no sense, and then, if a prospective customer had trouble understanding the "product," they didn't vocally agree that it sure was difficult to understand, didn't make a good-faith effort to explain the complicated reasoning behind it, but simply kept hammering on the written pitch. And clearly this was the path to success, and it was all a double disillusionment to Pip, who not only felt actively punished for using her brain but was presented every month with fresh evidence that Bay Area consumers on average responded better to a rote and semi-nonsensical pitch than to a well-meaning saleswoman trying to help them understand the offer. — Jonathan Franzen

'Live each day as if it is your last,' said Mahatma Gandhi. 'Learn as if you'll live forever.' This is what I'm passionate about. It is precisely this. It is this inextinguishable, undaunted appetite for learning and experience, no matter how risible, no matter how esoteric, no matter how seditious it might seem. — Benjamin B. Dunlap

If (early humans) weren't using and refining language I would like to know what they were doing with their autocatalytically increasing brains. — Dean Falk

Sometimes a useful delusion is better than a useless truth. — Colson Whitehead

If you look at some of the clips of me in the operating room, I sit in the chair, I control the microscope with my mouth, I connect, my hands are always working in the brain, my feet are controlling everything. — Alfredo Quinones-Hinojosa

Nobody is so weird others can't identify with them. — Rebecca Miller

There are moments in life when you blunder in front of a window, or a glass. And you stop to see the most risible creature peering back at you, in some hideous weskit that he has mistaken for the very pineapple of fashion, a kingsman slung round his neck like the banner of his pretentions, with an expression of adolescent constipation that is clearly intended as Deep Sagacity. You blink - you may even for an instant begin to laugh - until the realization dawns: this is a reflection, and it is mine. You've draped yourself in Rainbow togs and swaddled yourself in fervent convictions, but in that reflection there you stand: exposed in the knobbly white nakedness of your own absurdity. — Ian Weir

N the 21st century, we
don't need to march against size zero models, risible pornography,
lap-dancing clubs and Botox. We don't need to riot, or go on hunger
strike. There's no need to throw ourselves under a horse, or even a
donkey. We just need to look it in the eye, squarely, for a minute,
and then start laughing at it. We look hot when we laugh. People
fancy us when they observe us giving out relaxed, earthy chuckles. — Caitlin Moran

Fortunately, I find that if a situation is funny or risible enough, I tend to bleed less profusely. — J.D. Salinger

March against size-zero models, risible pornography, lap-dancing clubs, and Botox. We don't need to — Caitlin Moran

ground-nuts to keep you alive till I return. If any of you do not know how to clean and cook them, Captain Grant will show you. I promise you I will have all the food you want at this place — Michael Joseph Canavan

If your work doesn't speak to people, it's beyond comprehension and risible, but if people engage with it, you become tarred with the brush of populism. — Antony Gormley

When a story or part of a story comes to me, I turn it over in my mind a long time before starting to write. I might make notes or take long drives or who knows what. By the time I give myself permission to write, I know certain things, though not everything. I know where the story is headed, and I know certain crucial points along the way. — Steven Millhauser

The magic of boy meets girl, the angst of catch and release, the serendipity of meant-to-be, It doesn't matter if a romantic comedy follows a predictable course, we respond because it's rooted in truth. In magic. — Victoria Van Tiem