quotations about beards
Growing a beard is like undertaking a flight. First you have the idea which you dare not reveal to a soul. You feel that there will be wide open spaces you cannot cover. If it fails, have you the courage to face the condescending pity which people have for failures? If it succeeds, have you the endurance to be pleasant to everyone who asks why you did it?
SIR FRANCIS CHICHESTER
Lonely Sea and Sky
Jimmy wearing a beard is like Beth wearing one of her big, black, shapeless sweaters that covers her butt. But she's not wearing one of those sweaters tonight. She's wearing her Goldie Hawn dress, and Jimmy's wearing a beard. Interesting.
LISA GENOVA
Love Anthony
For me, the great problem growing up in England was that I had a very narrow concept of what god can be, and it was damn close to an old man with a beard.
JOHN CLEESE
The Gospel According to John Cleese
All the men in my family were born bearded, and most of the women.
W.C. FIELDS
attributed, The English Shaving Co.
Ere on thy chin the springing beard began
To spread a doubtful down, and promise man.
MATTHEW PRIOR
An Ode to the Memory of the Honourable Colonel George Villiers
It's a little tragic, it's a little weird
ZZ Top are prisoners of their beards
Imagine them weightless in outerspace
Beards and shades flyin' all over the place
CHRISTINE LAVIN
"Prisoners of Their Hairdos"
If you think that to grow a beard is to acquire wisdom, a goat is at once a complete Plato.
LUCIAN
Greek Anthology
Mendham was a cadaverous man with a magnificent beard. He looked, indeed, as though he had run to beard as a mustard plant does to seed.
H.G. WELLS
The Wonderful Visit
There is something about a man with a beard I cannot stand. No particular reason for it. Prejudice, I suppose. I feel the same way about cats.
CHARLES WILLEFORD
Pick-Up
This beard is like a winter night, long, dark, and cold.
GEORGE LAMB
New Arabian Nights Entertainments
You may wear, if you choose, a beard pick-a-devant,
A beard like a hammer, or jagg'd like a saw--
A beard call'd "cathedral," and shaped like a tile,
Which the widow in Hudibras served to beguile.
A beard like a dagger--nay, don't be afraid--
A beard like a bodkin, a beard like a spade;
A beard like a sugar-loaf, beard like a fork,
A beard like a Hebrew, a beard like a Turk.
Any one of these beards may be yours if you list--
According to fancy you trim it or twist.
As to colour, that matters, I ween, not a pin--
But a bushy black beard is the surest to win.
THOMAS CAMPBELL
"The Ballad of the Beard"
Now Jove, in his next commodity of hair, send thee a beard!
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Twelfth Night
Any man can start a beard. A true man never finishes one.
ANONYMOUS
Moustache, no
Sideburns, no
Goatee, maybe
Beard, beard
PSYCHOSTICK
"Obey the Beard"
Alas, poor chin! many a wart is richer.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Troilus and Cressida
His beard is like the thistle of the pastures, when the northwind whistleth on the hills. Ewen hath mowed it with his cutlass, as the wildgoat goat croppeth the flower.
JAMES MACPHERSON
The Fingal of Ossian
The only reason to shave your beard is the joy of growing it again.
ANONYMOUS
Why do old men grow huge beards as if to proclaim a manhood that has long since fled?
JEANE WESTIN
His Last Letter
His beard grows fast as blazes, like a damp wicket in springtime sun, green, and Rachel's skin is so fine, his bristles can score her red the way a new ball marks a bat, English alum on English unbleached willow, finest quality, special selection, Rachel-grade.
EMMA RICHLER
Be My Wolff
If certain beards are archetypal (like Santa or Satan), then what are all of us modern guys saying with our hairy Rorschachs, and why now? Is it rebellion, conformity, or a half-hearted compromise between the two? Do women like beards? Did they ever? What's the post-modern, post-feminist meaning of facial hair?
ALLAN PETERKIN
One Thousand Beards: A Cultural History of Facial Hair