Satires Quotes & Sayings

Of all the ingenious and cruel satires that from the beginning till now have been stuck like knives into womankind, surely there is not one so lacerating to them, and to us who love them, as the trite old fact, that the most wretched of men can, in the twinkling of an eye, find a wife ready to be more wretched still for the sake of his company. Edward hastened to despatch his — Thomas Hardy

We pay homage to the people who came before, doing satires, like Mel Brooks; we're just carrying the torch. — Shawn Wayans

Smart writers never understand why their satires on our town are never successful. What they refuse to accept is that you can't satirize a satire. — Hedda Hopper

Satires which the censor can understand are justly forbidden — Karl Kraus

And had a face like a bulldog licking vinegar off a thistle ... — Terry Pratchett

Our fathers were actually business partners in the same real-estate firm, and we got together and thought, How can we get a movie together and get distribution and create a new movie genre? We started by making satires of commercials. — David Zucker

In a badly designed book, the letters mill and stand like starving horses in a field. In a book designed by rote, they sit like stale bread and mutton on the page. In a well-made book, where designer, compositor and printer have all done their jobs, no matter how many thousands of lines and pages, the letters are alive. They dance in their seats. Sometimes they rise and dance in the margins and aisles. — Robert Bringhurst

All the satires of the stage should be viewed without discomfort. They are public mirrors, where we are never to admit that we seeourselves; one admits to a fault when one is scandalized by its censure. — Moliere

Well, these sad and hopeless obstacles are welcome in one sense, for they enable us to look with indifference upon the cruel satires that Fate loves to indulge in. — Thomas Hardy

For a young and presumptuous poet a disposition to write satires is one of the most dangerous he can encourage. It tempts him to personalities, which are not always forgiven after he has repented and become ashamed of them. — Robert Southey

Cameron Indoor Stadium is a special place in sports and there's really nothing else out there quite like it. Anytime I'm inside Cameron, I've got memories. Cameron is like Yankee Stadium or the old Boston Garden. — Grant Hill

[ ... ] atheists are the most reviled minority in the United States. Polls indicate that being an atheist is a perfect impediment to running for high office in our country (while being black, Muslim, or homosexual is not). — Sam Harris

The Wit of Cheats, the Courage of a Whore,
Are what ten thousand envy and adore:
All, all look up, with reverential Awe,
At crimes that 'scape, or triumph o'er the Law:
While Truth, Worth, Wisdom, daily they decry-'
'Nothing is sacred now but Villainy'

- Epilogue to the Satires, Dialogue I — Alexander Pope

It's not because I'm bitter or because I don't agree with him politically. I've always been a registered Republican. But it's bad taste to talk about ex-husbands and ex-wives, that's all. Also, I don't know a damn thing about politics. — Jane Wyman

Odes were the compositions in which he took most delight, and it was long before he liked his Epistles and Satires. He told me what he read solidly at Oxford was Greek; not the Grecian historians, but Homer and Euripides, and now and then a little Epigram; that the study of which he was the most fond was Metaphysicks, but he had not read much, even in that way. — Samuel Johnson

If the mystery can be reduced to one solution, it lies in a simple coincidence: Rimbaud's interest in his own work had survived the realization that the world would not be changed by verbal innovation. It did not survive the failure of all his adult relationships. He had always treated poems as a form of private communication. He gave his songs to chansonniers, his satires to satirists. Without a constant companion, he was writing in a void. — Graham Robb

If some event happens and it seems really important to me and moving to me, I'll write it down in my lyric book knowing that it will come out in a song. — Amy Ray

The world is so full of ill-nature that I have lampoons sent me by people who cannot spell, and satires composed by those who scarce know how to write. — Joseph Addison

Satires and lampoons on particular people circulate more by giving copies in confidence to the friends of the parties, than by printing them. — Richard Brinsley Sheridan

We made satires of everything - news broadcasts and TV shows that we watched. When I look at them now, they are totally amateurish, but I find it quite remarkable that we were so skeptical of the world! My parents watched them and thought they were funny; they really encouraged us. — Lev Yilmaz

There is nothing that more betrays a base ungenerous spirit than the giving of secret stabs to a man's reputation. Lampoons and satires that are written with wit and spirit are like poisoned darts, which not only inflict a wound, but make it incurable. — Joseph Addison

A culture cannot evolve without honest, powerful storytelling. When a society repeatedly experiences glossy, hollowed-out, pseudo-stories, it degenerates. We need true satires and tragedies, dramas and comedies that shine a clean light into the dingy corners of the human psyche and society. — Robert McKee

I like the type of culture that the Internet allows to happen. And, of course, for some bizarre reason, that is cats! — Cory Arcangel

Personal responsibility for everything is the hallmark of an enlightened being. If you blame others, bad luck or the Universe/God for your difficulties, you clearly do not understand the Principle of Oneness. You are in charge and responsible for everything. Embrace your power and make no excuses. — Russell Anthony Gibbs

The satires of Isaiah against the makers of idols of wood and gold apply just as much to the makers of conceptual idols. the simple man sculpts a bit of wood and prostrates himself: "You are my God"...
The intelligent man sculpts a concept and does likewise. And he thinks he got there because he has made a god of his own size! — Henri Le Saux

As I watched the men throw more earth into the grave, I dug into the cold soil of my own mind, and it became suddenly clear - the way things always become clearer only after they have happened - that Ikenna was a fragile delicate bird; he was a sparrow. Little things could unbridle his soul. Wistful thoughts often combed his melancholic spirit in search of craters to be filled with sorrow. As a younger boy, he often sat in the backyard, brooding and contemplative, his arms clasped over his knees. He was highly critical of things, a part of him that greatly resembled Father. He nailed small things to big crosses and would ponder for long on a wrong word he said to someone; he greatly dreaded the reprove of others. He had no place for ironies or satires; they troubled him. — Chigozie Obioma

Culturally, I have always been part of the proletariat. I lived side by side with the sons of glassblowers, fishermen and smugglers. The stories they told were shaper satires about the hypocrisy of authority and the middle classes, the two-facedness of teachers and lawyers and politicians. I was born politicized. — Dario Fo

With God, the impossible is not an obstacle but an invitation. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

The bitterest satires and noblest eulogies on married life have come from poets. — Edwin Percy Whipple