Top 188 Twain Quotes & Sayings - Page 2

The public only knows one side of [Mark Mark Twain] - the amusing part. Little does it suspect that he was a man of strong convictions upon political and social questions and a moralist of no mean order.

Tacked above my desk are photos of artists I admire - Hopper, Sargent, Twain - and postcards from beloved bookstores where I've spent all my time and money - Tattered Cover, Elliot Bay, Harvard Bookstore.

I'd love for us to be on our way to having a career like Reba McEntire or Shania Twain; to be Entertainer of the Year, to have headlined big tours, and really be women when we're doing it.

I ascribe to Mark Twain's theory that the last person who should be President is the one who wants it the most. The one who should be picked is the one who should be dragged kicking and screaming into the White House.

I am built funny. Picture Mark Twain's head on Ichabod Crane's body. Now hold your mental picture to the light and crumple it.

Girl, when he gives you kisses twain, use one, and let the other stay; And hoard it, for moons die, red fades, and you may need a kiss—some day.

Science is moving closer to weaponry, and Art is moving closer to commercialism. And never the twain shall meet.

I first read 'Tom Sawyer' when I was in 8th grade, 13 years old. I realised since that Mark Twain just bottled what it felt like to be a child.

But now, you are twain, you are cloven apart Flesh of his flesh, but heart of my heart.

Oh East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet.

[Mark Twain] is still the rough, awkward, good-natured boy who swore at the deck hands when he was three years old. Thoroughly likeable as a good fellow, but impossible as a man of letters.

I don't play golf. Mark Twain is golf to me.

I was in the death struggle with self: God and Satan fought for my soul those three long hours. God conquered — now I have only one doubt left — which of the twain was God?

I particularly admire are Mark Twain and Jerome K. Jerome who wrote in a certain tone of voice which was humane and understanding of humanity, but always ready to annotate its little foibles. I think I'd lay my cards down on that, and say that it's that that I'm trying to do.

Mark Twain didn't psychoanalyze Huck Finn or Tom Sawyer. Dickens didn't put Oliver Twist on the couch because he was hungry! Good copy comes out of people, Johnny, not out of a lot of explanatory medical terms.

I've always liked the classic "young adult" writers like Mark Twain, Jack London, Roald Dahl, Charles Dickens. They write so clearly, and they know how to entertain.

What would men be without women? Scarce, sir, mighty scarce. Mark Twain Women are an alien race set down among us.

We twain have met like the ships upon the sea, Who behold an hour's converse, so short, so sweet: One little hour! and then, away they speed On lonely paths, through mist, and cloud, and foam, To meet no more.

Mark Twain created a new type of literature and not a lot of people can say that. Not a lot of people can say they're absolutely original and completely self-made.

A man once said, 'All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.' Mark Twain, you know. He had a fine mustache. Men of wisdom so often do.

You can go into Mark Twain's material and prove anything you want. He was against war. He was for war. He was against rich people and he was for them. He was a kaleidoscope.

Care draws on care, woe comforts woe again, Sorrow breeds sorrow, on grief brings forth twain.

Mark Twain had it backwards. Nowadays everybody is doing something about the weather, but nobody is talking about it.

When you study history in American schools, very rarely is the name John Brown mentioned. We know who Kanye West is or Twyla Tharp or Shania Twain.

If Mark Twain had had Twitter, he would have been amazing at it. But he probably wouldn't have gotten around to writing Huckleberry Finn.

[Mark] Twain called Congress "the only distinctly native criminal class in America. We've lately sent a United States Senator to the penitentiary." That was a fact.

You can go into Mark Twain's material and prove anything you want. He was against war. He was for war. He was against rich people and he was for them. He was a kaleidoscope

The best American writers have come from the hinterlands -- Mark Twain, Theodore Dreiser, Jack London, Hemingway, Faulkner, Wolfe, Steinbeck. Most of them never even went to college.

I'd like to make people who see me in comic pantomime on the screen feel the way Mark Twain makes his readers feel.

Departed suns their trails of splendor drew Across departed summers: whispers came From voices, long ago resolved again Into the primeval Silence, and we twain, Ghosts of our present selves, yet still the same, As in a spectral mirror wandered there.

Mark Twain married the daughter of one of New York State's leading Abolitionists, Jervis Langdon, who helped Frederick Douglass who became the great Negro leader to escape from slavery.

Right from the start, I loved the works of Mark Twain. Every time I read about Tom Sawyer, I'd go out and do something low-level naughty, just like him.

Those who have heard me speak from time to time know that quite often I cite the observation of that great American author, Mark Twain, who said, history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.

You don't know about me, without you have read a book by the name of 'The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,' but that ain't no matter. That book was made by a Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly.

I should have caught the mistake on that spelling bee card. But as Mark Twain once said, `You should never trust a man who has only one way to spell a word'.

Mark Twain was so good with crowds that he became, in competition with singers and dancers and actors and acrobats, one of the most popular performers of his time. It is so unusual, and so psychologically unlikely, too, for a great writer to be a great performer, too.

Madeleine L'Engle's 'A Wrinkle in Time' has been targeted by censors for promoting New Ageism, and Mark Twain's 'Adventures of Huckleberry Finn' for promoting racism. Gee, where does that leave the kids?

Well: Love and Pain Be kinfolks twain; Yet would, Oh would I could Love again.

There ain't no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them. - Mark Twain, author Making the team is one thing, becoming a team is another.

Mark Twain is a voice of truth and a voice of equality and a voice of tolerance. Which means he is a voice of love.

[Mark] Twain was a publisher. He published General Grant's Memoirs (a big success) and had a hand in the publishing of many of his own books. He would, I think, be very keen about the question of how a book would sell.

When I was a young child and before he had left us for the U.S., my father would give me Mark Twain novels. In the characters, the weather and the context, my father must have seen many parallels to his own youth in the Caribbean in the 1930s and 40s.

I suppose most writers are following Twain's advice to tackle what they know, and my own readings habits drew me to writers who seemed to be writing honestly from their own experiences, whether they presented it in the guise of fiction or not.

Someone asked why I invited Jon Stewart to be the first guest on the 'Journal''s premiere in 2007. 'Because Mark Twain isn't available,' I answered. I was serious.

I was in the generation of CDs, so when I moved to L.A., I think I probably brought my Shania Twain Come on Over CD. But if I lived in the '80s, I would definitely be the one going to the record stores.

I bought a book of Mark Twain quotes. That's about my speed. I'll read a couple quotes and put it down.

When I was a kid, I was obsessed with Shania Twain. I would always go sing the song 'Honey I'm Home.' I was, like, 12, and I'm singing about coming home from work and PMS and stuff.

The best stories in our culture have some sort of subversiveness - Mark Twain, 'Catcher in the Rye.' You provide kids with great stories and teach them how to use the tools to make their own.

I've had to stop going to the nearest grocery store that seems to play Shania Twain's 'Forever and For Always' whenever I'm there. It's hard to shop for frozen entrees through cold-air blasted tears. Feels good on a flushed face though.

I've been enjoying 'Life on the Mississippi' by Mark Twain that I picked up at the airport randomly. It's very witty and interesting to read about his time as a steamboat pilot.

My music comes from country music. Merle Haggard is God, and I do believe that. I'm not too tuned in to country music. I don't know who Brooks and Dunn are. I like Shania Twain, though!

Mark Twain said (particularly about Pink Marsh): "I have been reading him again, and my admiration overflows all limits. ... How effortless the limning! It is as if the work did itself, without help of the master's hand."

To make fun of an administration, to make fun of anything, Mark Twain said, is the last defense of democracy.

Poor Desdemona! I am glad thy father's dead. Thy match was mortal to him, and pure grief Shore his old thread in twain.

Singularity is seen as an event horizon. There's everything that comes before it and everything that comes after it and never the twain shall meet, in much the same way that Judeo-Christian theology presents its notion of the afterlife - there's a very clear and impermeable demarcation there.

Whether will the twain will ye that I release unto you?

People say footballers have terrible taste in music but I would dispute that. In the car at the moment I've got The Corrs, Cher, Phil Collins, Shania Twain and Rod Stewart.

It's such an honor to receive the Mark Twain Prize. To get the same award that has been given to people like Bill Cosby, Tina Fey and Will Ferrell, it really makes me wonder… why didn't I get this sooner?

Mark Twain is a universe, and he is also a kind of American authority figure. He can say things to America that other people can't say, in a way that can truly be heard.

Thinking of Poe, thinking of Mark Twain and Vachel Lindsay, thinking of Jack London and Tom Wolfe, one begins to feel there is almost no way of becoming a creative writer in America without being a loser.