Lillian Hellman Quotes - Page 2

Quotes about:

• Drinking makes uninteresting people matter less and late at night, matter not at all.

  Lillian Hellman

  Drinking, Night, People

  11 Copy quote

• Mama seemed to do only what my father wanted, and yet we lived the way my mother wanted us to live.

  Lillian Hellman

  Mother, Father, Way

  9 Copy quote

• Courtesy is breeding. Breeding is an excellent thing. Always remember that.

  Lillian Hellman

  Remember, Courtesy, Excellent

  13 Copy quote

• Guilt is often an excuse for not thinking.

  Lillian Hellman

  Thinking, Guilt, Excuse

  12 Copy quote

• Fashions in sin change.

  Lillian Hellman

  Fashion, Sin

  Lillian Hellman (1979). “Six Plays”, Vintage

  8 Copy quote

• as one grows older, one realizes how little one knows about any relationship, or even about oneself.

  Lillian Hellman

  Littles, Realizing, Grows

  8 Copy quote

• Childhood is less clear to me than to many people: when it ended I turned my face away from it for no reason that I know about, certainly without the usual reason of unhappy memories. For many years that worried me, but then I discovered that the tales of former children are seldom to be trusted. Some people supply too many past victories or pleasures with which to comfort themselves, and other people cling to pains, real and imagined, to excuse what they have become.

  Lillian Hellman

  Children, Pain, Memories

  30 Copy quote

• Nobody knows what you want except you. And nobody will be as sorry as you if you don't get it. Wanting some other way to live is proof enough of deserving it. Having it is hard work, but not having it is sheer hell.

  Lillian Hellman

  Sorry, Hard Work, Deserving It

  19 Copy quote

• Advances are made by those with at least a touch of irrational confidence in what they can do.

  Lillian Hellman

  Confidence, Made, Irrational

  21 Copy quote

• No one can argue any longer about the rights of women. It's like arguing about earthquakes.

  Lillian Hellman

  Equality, Earthquakes, Rights

  15 Copy quote

• You don't always know how to do things when they're happening.

  Lillian Hellman

  Know How, Knows, Happenings

  Lillian Hellman (1974). “Another Part of the Forest: Play in Three Acts”, p.61, Dramatists Play Service Inc

  18 Copy quote

• Lonely people, in talking to each other can make each other lonelier.

  Lillian Hellman

  Lonely, Loneliness, Being Alone

  Lillian Hellman (1952). “The Autumn Garden: Play in Three Acts”, p.35, Dramatists Play Service Inc

  18 Copy quote

• Belief is a moral act for which the believer is to be held responsible.

  Lillian Hellman

  Belief, Moral, Responsible

  10 Copy quote

• We all lead more pedestrian lives than we think we do. The boiling of an egg is sometimes more important than the boiling of a love affair in the end.

  Lillian Hellman

  Thinking, Eggs, Important

  Lillian Hellman, Jackson R. Bryer (1986). “Conversations with Lillian Hellman”, p.200, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  5 Copy quote

• Haven't you lived in the South long enough to know that nothing is ever anybody's fault?

  Lillian Hellman

  Long, Faults, Enough

  Lillian Hellman (1952). “The Autumn Garden: Play in Three Acts”, p.18, Dramatists Play Service Inc

  11 Copy quote

• History is made by masses of people. One man, or ten men, don't start the earthquakes and don't stop them either. Only hero worshipers and ignorant historians think they do.

  Lillian Hellman

  Hero, Men, Thinking

  Lillian Hellman (1944). “The Searching Wind: A Play in Two Acts”, New York : The Viking Press

  13 Copy quote

• Old paint on canvas, as it ages, sometimes becomes transparent. When that happens it is possible, in some pictures, to see the original lines: a tree will show through a woman's dress, a child makes way for a dog, a large boat is no longer on an open sea. That is called pentimento because the painter 'repented', changed his mind. Perhaps it would be as well to say that the old conception, replaced by a later choice, is a way of seeing and then seeing again.

  Lillian Hellman

  Dog, Children, Sea

  Lillian Hellman, Jackson R. Bryer (1986). “Conversations with Lillian Hellman”, p.138, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  14 Copy quote

• Writers are interesting people, but often mean and petty.

  Lillian Hellman

  Sarcastic, Mean, People

  Lillian Hellman, Jackson R. Bryer (1986). “Conversations with Lillian Hellman”, p.70, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  12 Copy quote

• God forgives those who invent what they need.

  Lillian Hellman

  Forgiving, Needs, Invention

  Lillian Hellman (1979). “Six Plays”, Vintage

  19 Copy quote

• It doesn't pay well to fight for what we believe in.

  Lillian Hellman

  Believe, Fighting, Pay

  Lillian Hellman (1942). “Four plays”

  14 Copy quote

• It is a mark of many famous people that they cannot part with their brightest hour.

  Lillian Hellman

  Change, Women, People

  Pentimento "Theatre" (1973)

  13 Copy quote

• But maybe half a lie is worse than a real lie.

  Lillian Hellman

  Real, Lying, Half

  Lillian Hellman (1979). “Six Plays”, Vintage

  9 Copy quote

• I'm good at embroidery. It's what I always wanted to do.... Yep, instead of whoring, I just wanted to do fancy embroidery.

  Lillian Hellman

  Embroidery, Fancy, Needlework

  19 Copy quote

• Fear comes with middle age.

  Lillian Hellman

  Age, Middle, Middle Ages

  Lillian Hellman, Jackson R. Bryer (1986). “Conversations with Lillian Hellman”, p.61, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  7 Copy quote

• If you believe, as the Greeks did, that man is at the mercy of the gods, then you write tragedy. The end is inevitable from the beginning. But if you believe that man can solve his own problems and is at nobody's mercy, then you will probably write melodrama.

  Lillian Hellman

  Believe, Writing, Men

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  29 Copy quote

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