Irony Quotes

• At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed.

  Frederick Douglass

  Argument, Needed, Convincing

  What to the Slave is the 4th of July?, delivered 4 July 1852

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• If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.

  W. Somerset Maugham

  Freedom, Patriotic, Libertarian Party

  "Strictly Personal" by W. Somerset Maugham, (ch. 31), 1941.

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• I suppose that's one of the ironies of life doing the wrong thing at the right moment.

  Charlie Chaplin

  Moments, Wrong Things, Right Moment

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• Irony is the hygiene of the mind.

  Elizabeth Bibesco

  Hygiene, Mind, Personal Hygiene

  Elizabeth Bibesco (1951). “Haven: Short Stories, Poems, and Aphorisms”

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• Irony is the gaiety of reflection and the joy of wisdom.

  Anatole France

  Humor, Reflection, Joy

  "The Literary Life". Book by Anatole France, 1888-1892.

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• Brain research tells us that only twenty percent of human beings have a sense of irony, which means that eighty percent of the world takes everything at face value.

  Douglas Coupland

  Mean, Brain, Twenties

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• Irony is an insult conveyed in the form of a compliment.

  Edwin Percy Whipple

  Insult, Compliment, Form

  Edwin Percy Whipple (1851). “Literature and life, lects”, p.52

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• The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.

  Socrates

  Life, Wisdom, Being Yourself

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• Irony is a disciplinarian feared only by those who do not know it, but cherished by those who do. He who does not understand irony and has no ear for its whispering lacks of what might called the absolute beginning of the personal life. He lacks what at moments is indispensable for the personal life, lacks both the regeneration and rejuvenation, the cleaning baptism of irony that redeems the soul from having its life in finitude though living boldly and energetically in finitude.

  Soren Kierkegaard

  Soul, Baptism, Ironic

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• If you want to please the critics, don't play too loud, too soft, too fast, too slow.

  Arturo Toscanini

  Music, Play, Want

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• The supreme irony of life is that hardly anyone gets out of it alive.

  Robert A. Heinlein

  Life, Success, Inspire

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• Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.

  Samuel Butler

  Sarcastic, Sarcasm, Argument

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• One interesting thing about greed is that although the underlying motive is to seek satisfaction, the irony is that even after obtaining the object of your desire you are still not satisfied. The true antidote of greed is contentment.

  Dalai Lama

  Buddhism, Interesting, Greed

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• Irony is the form of paradox. Paradox is what is good and great at the same time.

  Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

  Ironic, Literature, Paradox

  "Dialogue on Poetry and Literary Aphorisms" by Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel, translated by Ernst Behler and Roman Struc, (p. 151), 1968.

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• To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself.

  Albert Einstein

  Inspirational, Leadership, Fate

  Albert Einstein (2002). “Dear Professor Einstein: Albert Einstein's letters to and from children”

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• Humor brings insight and tolerance. Irony brings a deeper and less friendly understanding.

  Agnes Repplier

  Funny, Patience, Humor

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• She thougt of sunrise over the library slope at Cornell University that nobody out on it had seen because the slope faces west.

  Thomas Pynchon

  Sunrise, Library, West

  Thomas Pynchon (2012). “The Crying of Lot 49”, p.4, Penguin

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• A taste for irony has kept more hearts from breaking than a sense of humor, for it takes irony to appreciate the joke which is on oneself.

  Jessamyn West

  Lost Love, Heart, Humor

  Jessamyn West (1957). “To see the dream”

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• Irony regards every simple truth as a challenge.

  Mason Cooley

  Simple, Challenges, Regard

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• There is not much irony when people are being happy on screen.

  Carter Burwell

  Being Happy, People, Screens

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• Certainly, it seems true enough that there's a good deal of irony in the world... I mean, if you live in a world full of politicians and advertising, there's obviously a lot of deception.

  Kenneth Koch

  Mean, Hype, Deception

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• It could draw from a greater reservoir of freedom. The irony could develop an even greater ease.

  Elfriede Jelinek

  Ease, Draws, Reservoirs

  Interview with Marika Griehsel, www.nobelprize.org. November 2004.

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• I was not interested in irony; I wanted to emphasize the primacy of the idea in making art

  Sol LeWitt

  Art, Ideas, Not Interested

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• The problem is that once the rules of art are debunked, and once the unpleasant realities the irony diagnoses are revealed and diagnosed, 'then' what do we do?

  David Foster Wallace

  Art, Reality, Diagnosis

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• Probably it is impossible for humor to be ever a revolutionary weapon. Candide can do little more than generate irony.

  Lionel Trilling

  Humor, Littles, Weapons

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