Unmarried Women Quotes & Sayings

Over the years I've noticed that only men use this phrase - "unlucky in love" - in reference exclusively to unmarried women, as if they can't possibly comprehend that contentment or even happiness is possible without the centrality of a man. — Kate Bolick

Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians. — Sarah Moore Grimke

I know so well what becomes of unmarried women who aren't prepared to occupy a position. I've seen such pitiful cases in the South barely tolerated spinsters living upon the grudging patronage of sister's husband or brother's wife! stuck away in some little mouse-trap of a room encouraged by one in-law to visit another little birdlike women without any nest eating the crust of humility all their life! Is that the future that we've mapped out for ourselves? — Tennessee Williams

She thought too that women didn't know what to do with themselves these days which could turn them into harridans. Hardly a female friend she knew wasn't miserable. Either mind dumb with children, or in the married condition married to an earnest toiler, or lonely unmarried in their successful career. — J.P. Donleavy

What a relief, Nadya thought; in that light he would not be able to tell that she had been crying.
"You mean if it weren't for the blackout you wouldn't have come?" Dasha took up Shchagov's tone, flirting unconsciously, as she did with every unmarried man she met.
"By no means, never. In bright light women's faces are deprived of all their charm; it reveals their spiteful expressions, their envious glances, their premature wrinkles, their heavy cosmetics."
Nadya shuddered at the words "envious glances" - it was as if he had overheard their argument.
Shchagov went on:" If I were a woman, I would make it a law that lights be kept low. Then everyone would soon have a husband."
Dasha looked disapprovingly at Shchagov. He always talked that way, and she didn't like it. All his phrases seemed memorized, insincere. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Linnet's thudding heart raced blood through her veins, sending a flush of embarrassing heat to her face. She had been avoiding him, but she could never tell him why. It took all her discipline not to quail under Sir Anthony's penetrating gaze.
Blast the man. She'd lost count of the times he'd made her feel like a blushing maiden. Strictly speaking, she was still a maiden, but she'd given up blushing years ago - along with simpering, flirting, and so many other talents deemed useful to unmarried women.
Except, of course, in Sir Anthony's august presence. — Vanessa Kelly

In fact, Social Security is the only source of income nationwide for 29 percent of unmarried elderly women. — Ginny Brown-Waite

I'm a licensed private investigator and have been for quite a while. I'm a lone wolf, unmarried, getting middle-aged, and not rich. I've been in jail more than once and I don't do divorce business. I like liquor and women and chess and a few other things. The cops don't like me too well, but I know a couple I get along with. I'm a native son, born in Santa Rosa, both parents dead, no brothers or sisters, and when I get knocked off in a dark alley sometime, if it happens, as it could to anyone in my business, nobody will feel that the bottom has dropped out of his or her life. — Raymond Chandler

If I were anyone else ... your opera singer ... the woman across the hall ... would you have apologized?"
He looked confused. "No ... but you are neither of those women. You deserve better."
"Better," she repeated, frustrated. "That's just my point! You and the rest of society believe that it's better for me to be set upon a pedestal of primness and propriety - which might have been fine if a decade on that pedestal hadn't simply landed me on the shelf. Perhaps unmarried young women like our sisters should be there. But what of me?" Her voice dropped as she looked down at the cards in her hands. "I'm never going to get a chance to experience life from up there. All that is up there is dust and unwanted apologies. The same cage as hers" - she indicated the woman outside - "merely a different gilt. — Sarah MacLean

For young women, for the first time, it is as normal to be unmarried as it is to be married, even if it doesn't always feel that way. — Rebecca Traister

Gideon could not imagine any other young unmarried woman of his acquaintance passing up the opportunity to snare, if not himself, then the Carradice fortune. In any case, the number of women who'd rejected him in any way was gratifyingly small. Yet Miss Prudence Merridew had most unmistakably rejected him. Several times. Wielding that damned lethal reticule like a little Amazon, to emphasize her point. — Anne Gracie

Yes, many women who had pursued careers and not families experienced loneliness. But the question of whether that loneliness would be ameliorated by marriage
any marriage
was one that didn't get attention, even when another executive explained to the paper that some choices about remaining unmarried were made expressly to escape the unhappiness of an earlier generation of married women: When you think of your mother as helpless, unable to choose her own life, you become determined never to be vulnerable. — Rebecca Traister

Unmarried women in their forties, with false teeth and tousled hair, aren't usually held in the highest esteem by our society. The feeling seemed to be that if I could be a success then anyone could! — Susan Boyle

Our fathers waged a bloody conflict with England, because they were taxed without being represented. This is just what unmarried women of property are now. — Angelina Grimke

We hope the day will soon come when every girl will be a member of a great Union of Unmarried Women, pledged to refuse an offer ofmarriage from any man who is not an advocate of their emancipation. — Tennessee Celeste Claflin

So what do people call unmarried adult women now? Um. Women, he said. — Anonymous

Social Security makes up a much larger share of total retirement income for unmarried women and minorities than it does for married couples, unmarried men and whites. — Diane Watson

Yeah, remember, under the Bush administration, welfare - I mean, excuse me, poverty among African Americans and among single unmarried women, poverty was at the lowest rate ever in the history of this country. So Obama's policies are not working, Bush polices worked! For long a time as a matter of fact. — Rick Santorum

(As for unmarried women, I have no idea where they are buried. For a very long time, in Korea, no one talked about them.) — Suki Kim

So far it has been assumed that the only pregnancies which are aborted are accidental ones and the only foetuses destroyed those whose mothers could not bear the thought of their becoming children. In a just world this would be the case, but the world is far from just. Too many women are forced to abort by poverty, by their menfolk, by their parents. Poverty has many faces; it may be the poverty of the young, the unmarried, the student, the unemployed, the female or a combination of these. — Germaine Greer

Marriage works best for men than women. The two happiest groups are married men and unmarried women. — Gloria Steinem

My profession brought me in contact with various minds. Earnest, serious discussion on the condition of woman enlivened my business room; failures of banks, no dividends from railroads, defalcations of all kinds, public and private, widows and orphans and unmarried women beggared by the dishonesty, or the mismanagement of men, were fruitful sources of conversation; confidence in man as a protector was evidently losing ground, and women were beginning to see that they must protect themselves. — Harriot Kezia Hunt

If a man is unmarried, he is called a bachelor. If a woman is unmarried, she is called a spinster or an old maid. What is it about an unmarried woman that poses such a threat to the patriarchal order? Mainly, it is that women are no one's property when we're unmarried. We're under no one's control, and neither are our children. There is no telling what we might do or say. — Marianne Williamson

Generally, a woman would rather be married to any man that she doesn't hate, than remain unmarried to a man that she loves. — Mokokoma Mokhonoana

The majority of black women are unmarried today, including 70 percent of professional black women. — Michelle Alexander

[F]rom my years of understanding ... I happily chose this kind of life in which I yet live [i.e., unmarried], which I assure you for my own part hath hitherto best contented myself and I trust hath been most acceptable to God. From the which if either ambition of high estate offered to me in marriage by the pleasure and appointment of my prince ... or if the eschewing of the danger of my enemies or the avoiding of the peril of death ... could have drawn or dissuaded me from this kind of life, I had not now remained in this estate wherein you see me. But so constant have I always continued in this determination ... yet is it most true that at this day I stand free from any other meaning that either I have had in times past or have at this present. — Elizabeth I

According to a new study, women in satisfying marriages are less likely to develop cardiovascular diseases than unmarried women. So don't worry, lonely women, you'll be dead soon. — Tina Fey

Sir, married or unmarried, all women bleed. — Ronlyn Domingue

As unmarried business women we must constantly use our opportunities in business in such a way that we are prepared for the marriage which may be ours tomorrow. — Hortense Odlum

He that hath wife and children," says Lord Bacon, "hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief. Certainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men." I say the same of women. — Mary Wollstonecraft

But she had a lively acquaintaince with confinement through the works of women novelists, especially those of the unmarried ones. — Stella Gibbons

Women now have choices. They can be married, not married, have a job, not have a job, be married with children, unmarried with children. Men have the same choice we've always had: work, or prison. — Tim Allen

The virtues about marriage were mostly negative virtues. Being unmarried in a man's world was such a hassle that anything had to be better. Marriage was better. But not much. Damned clever, I thought, how men had made life so intolerable for single women that most would gladly embrace even bad marriages instead. — Erica Jong

As marriage was woman's business, unmarried women, though doubtless unfortunate, must simply be considered as business failures: harsh, doubtless, but in tune with the sink-or-swim capitalist times. — Ruth Brandon

Miss, n. A title with which we brand unmarried women to indicate they are in the market. Miss, Misses (Mrs.) and Mister (Mr.) are the three most distinctly disagreeable words in the language, in sound and sense. Two are corruptions of Mistress, the other of Master. In the general abolition of social titles in this our country they miraculously escaped to plague us. If we must have them let us be consistent and give one to the unmarried man. I venture to suggest Mush, abbreviated to Mh. — Ambrose Bierce

When I asked my father why Mademoiselle Finkelstein was such a cruel woman, he said it was because she was unmarried, which caused women to be come bitter, harsh, and unforgiving after they reached the age of thirty. of course, he explained, they made wonderful teachers, because they had the unfettered time to dedicate to their profession and they knew how to instill discipline. on the other hand, unmarried men, like his younger brother, Uncle Jihad, were simply eccentrics and did not suffer accordingly. The difference, he elaborated, was that men chose to be unmarried, whereas women had to live with never having been chosen. — Rabih Alameddine

In the New World, "spinster" gained a more precise meaning: in colonial parlance, it indicated an unmarried woman over the age of twenty-three and under the age of twenty-six. At twenty-six, women without spouses became thornbacks, a reference to a sea-skate with sharp spines covering its back and tail. It was not a compliment — Rebecca Traister

It was said that its existence protected decent women. An unmarried man could go to one of these houses and evacuate the sexual energy which was making him uneasy and at the same time maintain the popular attitudes about the purity and loveliness of women. It was a mystery, but then there are many mysterious things in our social thinking. — John Steinbeck

Liberating ourselves from the traditional strictures of marriage altogether, and/or transforming those strictures to include all of us -- gay, feminist, career-focused, baby crazy, monogamous, non-monogamous, skeptical, romantic, and everyone in between -- is the challenge facing this generation. As we consciously opt out or creatively reimagine marriage one loving couple at a time, we'll be able to shift societal expectations wholesale, freeing younger generations from some of the antiquated assumptions we've faced (that women always want to get married and men always shy away from commitment, that gender parity somehow disempowers men, that turning 30 makes an unmarried woman into an old maid). — Courtney E. Martin

It is a woman's business to get married as soon as possible, and a man's
to keep unmarried as long as he can. — George Bernard Shaw

Miss, n. A title which we brand unmarried women to indicate that they are in the market. — Ambrose Bierce

The impact of all this persistent inequity on the economic (in)stability of unmarried women is profound. — Rebecca Traister

Seagulls were the souls of dead soldiers. Owls were the souls of women. Doves were the recently departed souls of unmarried girls. Was — Ruta Sepetys

It was a business that engaged a significant part of the nation; the wool was given to village women to comb and to spin before being sent to the weaver; to this day, an unmarried woman is known as a spinster. — Peter Ackroyd

When men and women across the country reported how happy they felt, researchers found that jugglers were happier than others. By and large, the more roles, the greater the happiness. Parents were happier than nonparents, and workers were happier than nonworkers. Married people were much happier than unmarried people. Married people were generally at the top of the emotional totem pole. — Faye J Crosby

It's like the riddle of the Sphinx ... why are there so many great unmarried women, and no great unmarried men? — Sarah Jessica Parker

Working-class and poor women are also living outside of marriage, at even higher rates than their more privileged peers. When it comes to unmarried women and money, the unprecedented economic opportunity enjoyed by a few is a small fraction of a far more complicated story. — Rebecca Traister

With the Holy Mother as the centre of inspiration, a Math is to be established on the eastern bank of the Ganga ... On the other side of the Ganga a big plot of land will be acquired, where unmarried girls or Brahmacharini widows will live; devout married women will also be allowed to stay now and then. Men will have no concern with this Math. — Swami Vivekananda

Miss: A title with which we brand unmarried women to indicate that they are in the market. Miss, Misses (Mrs.) and Mister (Mr.) are the three most distinctly disagreeable words in the language, in sound and sense. — Ambrose Bierce

Women always think in the catastrophic, and when there is a calamity to rectify that might require a unmarried granddaughter, there older women will always act. Their powers of foresight and vigilance might make any disheveled or nubile young haggage ready for the altar in five minutes. — Michelle Franklin

It is also only in humans that aggression may be used to commit crimes, to enslave others or compel acquiescence to religious or ideological doctrine, or to pursue wars of national interest. At the individual level, men are universally more aggressive than women, and rates of aggressive confrontation are greatest among those who are young, poor, or unmarried. Cultural factors moderate human aggression as well, with men's heightened sensitivity to signs of disrespect, challenge, or threat spawning a high frequency of confrontational violence in so-called "cultures of honor". — Randy J. Nelson

DePaulo says that 'singlism'
a term she coined and for which we are prepared to forgive her
is not just aimed at unmarried women. — Gail Collins

The Great Depression of the 1930s saw more American unmarried women working from nine to five, mostly in repetitive, boring, subordinate, dead-end jobs. But the number of working women doubled between 1870 and 1940. During World War II it doubled once again. — Helen Fisher

One of the things Obama's been doing is deliberately trying to increase the percentage of our population that is dependent on government for their living. For example, do you know what was the second-biggest demographic group that voted for Obama? ... Unmarried women. Seventy percent of unmarried women voted for Obama. And this is because, when you kick your husband out, you've got to have Big Brother government to be your provider ... — Phyllis Schlafly

Everyone knows that part of the spirit descends to the afterworld, while part of it remains with the family, but we have a special belief about the spirit of a young woman who has died before her marriage that goes contrary to this. She comes back to prey upon other unmarried girls
not to scare them but to take them to the afterworld with her so she might have company. — Lisa See

I knew the legends of the birds. Seagulls were the souls of dead soldiers. Owls were the souls of women. Doves were the recently departed souls of unmarried girls.
Was there a bird for the souls of people like me? — Ruta Sepetys

Why should unmarried women be discriminated against - unmarried men are not. — Dinah Shore

For the love of ammonites, man! That's just stupid. Why on earth would the Society need to protect unmarried women from bone-dry lectures regarding soil composition? Do your members find themselves whipped into some sort of dusty frenzy, from which no delicate lass would be safe?"
Mr. Barrington tugged on his coat. "Sometimes the debate does get heated."
Colin turned to her. "Min, Can I just hit him?"
"I think that's a bad idea."
"run him through with something sharp? — Tessa Dare

In comparison, young unmarried women in America were fortunate: They had a certain measure of sexual freedom. Eighteenth-century parents allowed their daughters to spend tie with suitors unsupervised, and courting couples openly engaged in "bundling," the practice of sleeping together without undressing, in the girls' homes. (Theoretically, that is, they were sleeping together without undressing: in fact, premarital pregnancy boomed during the period of 1750 to 1780, when bundling was nearly universal.) But by the turn of the century, in a complete reversal of previous beliefs about women's sexuality, the idea took hold that only men were carnal creatures; women were thought to be passionless and therefore morally superior. — Leora Tanenbaum

Married and unmarried women waste a great deal of time in feeling sorry for each other. — Myrtle Reed

As the second decade of the twenty-first century has worn on, politicians of all stripes, aware of the political power of the unmarried woman yet seemingly incapable of understanding female life outside of a marital context, have come to rely on a metaphor in which American women, no longer bound to men, are binding themselves to government. — Rebecca Traister

Women's work, married or unmarried, is menial and low paid. Women's right to possess property is curtailed, more if they are married. How can marriage provide security? In any case a husband is a possession which can be lost or stolen and the abandoned wife of thirty odd with a couple of children is far more desolate and insecure in her responsibility than an unmarried woman with or without children ever could be. — Germaine Greer