Provocative Quotes - Page 9

• Let me assure you that my intent is not to offend or merely be provocative. I'm simply worried.

  Sam Harris

  Worried, Let Me

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• Finnick?" I say, "Maybe some pants?" He looks down at his legs as if noticing his outfit for the first time. Then he whips off his hospital gown leaving him in just his underwear. "Why? Do you find this" -- he strikes a ridiculously provocative pose -- "distracting?" I laugh. Boggs looks embarrassed and Finnick looks more like the guy I met at the Quarter Quell

  Suzanne Collins

  Laughing, Guy, Leaving

  Suzanne Collins (2010). “Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3)”, p.79, Scholastic Inc.

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• Vampire? Such a provocative word, wrapped in too many clichés and girly novels.

  Matt Haig

  Girly, Vampire, Novel

  Matt Haig (2011). “The Radleys: A Novel”, p.116, Simon and Schuster

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• To my mind there is nothing so beautiful or so provocative as a secondhand book store...To me it is astonishing and miraculous to think that any one of us can poke among the stalls for something to read overnight--and that this something may be the sum of a lifetime of sweat, tears, and genius that some poor, struggling, blessed fellow expended trying to teach us the truth.

  Lionel Barrymore

  Beautiful, Struggle, Book

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• People think pop is rock, and the lines are getting blurred. Now Rihanna's wearing f-ckin' leather jackets, and it's really annoying . . . (My style is) high-class hooker. I dress for myself. Clearly, it's provocative, but it makes me feel good. And if the only reason it makes someone uncomfortable is because I'm 17, then that person's a scumbag because it shouldn't matter.

  Taylor Momsen

  Thinking, Rocks, Leather Jackets

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• The Playtex Secrets survey truly uncovered some thought-provoking and provocative secrets of real American housewives. In fact, many of the findings would make great fodder for a storyline on the show!

  Alfre Woodard

  Real, Thought Provoking, Secret

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• I remember saying to myself those things are very, very important to hear, but there must be another way to say them so that they will truly be heard. I mean, that's what art is. Art is about being provocative. Art is also about beauty. And if you leave the latter out, the former doesn't matter.

  Nikky Finney

  Art, Mean, Important

  "The Beauty And Difficulty Of Poet Nikky Finney". "Weekend Edition Sunday" with Rachel Martin, www.npr.org. April 8, 2012.

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• This is a major, wide-ranging, and comprehensive book. A philosophical investigation that is also a literary and historical study, Truth and Truthfulness asks how and why we have come to think of accuracy, sincerity, and authenticity as virtues. Bernard Williams' account of their emergence is as detailed and imaginative as his defense of their importance is spirited and provocative. Williams asks hard questions, and gives them straightforward and controversial answers. His book does not simply describe and advocate these virtues of truthfulness; it manifests them.

  Alexander Nehamas

  Book, Philosophical, Thinking

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• I'd been to Memphis before, but we stayed out of Memphis early on in the late 70s for obvious reasons. People were very sensitive about Elvis Presley, and my stage name obviously would be provocative to some people in that area at that time.

  Elvis Costello

  Names, People, Would Be

  "Interview about The Delivery Man". Interview with Brian Wise, www.elviscostello.info. April 10, 2004.

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• To say that war is madness is like saying that sex is madness: true enough, from the standpoint of a stateless eunuch, but merely a provocative epigram for those who must make their arrangements in the world as given.

  John Updike

  Funny, Sex, War

  Self-Consciousness ch. 4 (1989)

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• There is no such thing as a former KGB man.

  Vladimir Putin

  Men, Kgb, Former

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• The traditional difficulty of balancing the mechanical with the imaginative schools of photography still operates. In schools of photography meaningful art education is often lacking and on the strength of their technical ability alone students, deprived of a richer artistic training, are sent forth inculcated with the belief that they are creative photographers and artists. It is yet a fact that today, as in the past, the most inspiring and provocative works in photography come as much (and probably more) from those who are in the first place artists.

  Aaron Scharf

  Meaningful, Photography, Art

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• I'd rather not deal with such questions, because anyway it's like shearing a pig - lots of screams but little wool.

  Vladimir Putin

  Pigs, Wool, Littles

  "Putin: NSA whistleblower Snowden is in Moscow airport". Speech on an official visit to Finland, www.theguardian.com. June 26, 2013.

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• Thomas Sowell is America's foremost public intellectual and for good reason. His work covers almost every subject imaginable- race, economics, Marxism, ethnic groups, immigration patterns, just to name a few. He is persuasive and provocative and always scintillating. I've read all his books and never been even faintly disappointed. Black Rednecks & White Liberals is no exception.

  Fred Barnes

  Book, Redneck, Race

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• Regarding pushing the form, ideas interest me more than form. I think you can write a very subversive play in a three-act structure. The content makes the play. I feel the form is simply dressing, because ultimately, you want to communicate to the audience, and sometimes the best way to do that is to present a provocative idea in a format that is comfortable for them to receive. Then the idea will come through directly, right in solar plexus. After all, I want to make a living as an artist, and that means speaking to the audience in a form they can understand.

  Caridad Svich

  Mean, Writing, Thinking

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• Well, you got to remember, bin Laden killed 3,000 Americans and, in some ways, he and his ideology killed tens of thousands of his fellow Muslims, including Pakistanis. I understand that that was provocative and complicated for Pakistan, but only if you accept the idea that he was an acceptable member of Pakistani society.

  Sebastian Junger

  Ideas, Pakistan, Way

  "Journalist Sebastian Junger". "The Tavis Smiley show", www.pbs.org. June 10, 2011.

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• Robert Glennon is a leading-edge legal scholar and passionate water advocate whose thinking is central to an intense debate on the path forward to a water-secure world. I heartily recommend his provocative, information-packed, and highly readable new book Unquenchable.

  Maude Barlow

  Book, Thinking, Water

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• I don't understand how some of these young actresses are wearing such provocative, editorial items, when they haven't even established a career yet. It's hard to see past that. I'm not so sure that's smart in the long run.

  Allison Williams

  Running, Smart, Past

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• If you'd like to meet some fully realized characters while learning some specifics of Zimbabwe's postcolonial struggles, as I did, you're likely to come away with a vague feeling of dissatisfaction. If you're willing to settle for first-rate writing and provocative meditations on memory, corruption and loss, they are all here in abundance.

  Jabari Asim

  Memories, Struggle, Character

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• Provocative. Striking. Rachel Resnick is a virtuoso on the page. Her fearless examination of the desperate thirst to find love is guaranteed to break your heart. Yet her cool-eyed analysis of the roots of this addiction inspires hope that through committed self-understanding, maybe each of us can change toxic patterns, whatever they may be.

  Samantha Dunn

  Heart, Love Is, Self

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• The factor in human life provocative of a noble discontent is the gradual emergence of a sense of criticism, founded upon appreciation of beauty, and of intellectual distinction, and of duty.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Appreciation, Intellectual, Criticism

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• Etiquette is about all of human social behavior. Behavior is regulated by law when etiquette breaks down or when the stakes are high - violations of life, limb, property and so on. Barring that, etiquette is a little social contract we make that we will restrain some of our more provocative impulses in return for living more or less harmoniously in a community.

  Judith Martin

  Law, Community, Social Behavior

  "Polite Company". Interview with Hara Estroff Marano, www.psychologytoday.com. March 1, 1998.

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• Maybe the most provocative thing one can do - and I'm not the first one to do it - is to ask the moral and philosophical question: why are some people better than others? Why are some people more moral than others?

  David Bezmozgis

  Philosophical, People, Firsts

  Interview with Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

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• It is frequently said that speech that is intentionally provocative and therefore invites physical retaliation can be punished or suppressed. Yet, plainly no such general proposition can be sustained. Quite the contrary.... The provocative nature of the communication does not make it any the less expression. Indeed, the whole theory of free expression contemplates that expression will in many circumstances be provocative and arouse hostility. The audience, just as the speaker, has an obligation to maintain physical restraint.

  Thomas I. Emerson

  Integrity, Communication, Responsibility

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• I'm in awe of the universe, but I don't necessarily believe there's an intelligence or agent behind it. I do have a passion for the visual in religious rituals, though, even though they may be completely empty and bereft of substance. The incense is powerful and provocative, whether Buddhist or Catholic.

  David Bowie

  Religious, Buddhist, Powerful

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