WOMEN QUOTES XVIII

quotations about women

The burning gaze of a young woman, such as hath tasted man, shall not escape me; for I have a spirit keen to mark these things.

AESCHYLUS

fragment, Toxotides

Tags: Aeschylus


See, I will always have this penchant for what I call kamikaze women. I call them kamikazes because they, you know they crash their plane, they're self-destructive. But they crash into you, and you die along with them.

WOODY ALLEN

Husbands and Wives

Tags: Woody Allen


Man ... heats up like a lightbulb: red hot in the twinkling of an eye and cold again in a flash. The female, on the other hand ... heats up like an iron. Slowly, over a low heat, like tasty stew. But then, once she has heated up, there's no stopping her.

CARLOS RUIZ ZAFON

The Shadow of the Wind

Tags: Carlos Ruiz Zafon


It took him a moment to respond to the unguarded sweetness of her smile, her body calculated to a millimeter to suggest a bud yet guarantee a flower.

F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

Tender Is the Night


It has been our experience that women usually prefer thin, undernourished, flatchested females, dressed to the teeth, as a concept of "feminine beauty" -- and that men prefer exactly the opposite: voluptuous, well-rounded and undressed. The women's idealization of woman is actually a male counterpart, competing with man in society; man's view of women is far more truly feminine.

HUGH HEFNER

The Realist, May, 1961

Tags: Hugh Hefner


Every physical quality admired by men in women is in direct connection with the manifold functions of women for the propagation of the species.

JAMES JOYCE

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Tags: James Joyce


A woman's heart is much like the moon, always changing but always has a man in it.

GRENVILLE KLEISER

Dictionary of Proverbs

Tags: Grenville Kleiser


Women are not allowed to be complicated in our society. We still very much have a Madonna-whore complex. We're comfortable seeing women as great mothers, and then we're comfortable seeing them as hookers, but there's no in-between.

CHARLIZE THERON

Glamour Magazine, July 2008

Tags: Charlize Theron


Women are like that they don't acquire knowledge of people we are for that they are just born with a practical fertility of suspicion that makes a crop every so often and usually right they have an affinity for evil for supplying whatever the evil lacks in itself for drawing it about them instinctively as you do bed-clothing in slumber fertilizing the mind for it until the evil has served its purpose whether it ever existed or no.

WILLIAM FAULKNER

The Sound and the Fury

Tags: William Faulkner


The mere idea of marriage, as a strong possibility, if not always nowadays a reasonable likelihood, existing to weaken the will by distracting its straight aim in the life of practically every young girl, is the simple secret of their confessed inferiority in men's pursuits and professions today.

WILLIAM BOLITHO

Twelve Against the Gods

Tags: William Bolitho


Men survey women before treating them. Consequently how a woman appears to a man can determine how she will be treated.

JOHN BERGER

Ways of Seeing

Tags: John Berger


If you're a woman, it's almost impossible to establish a relationship. You're too much for everybody. It's too much. The woman always has to play this role of being fragile and dependent. And if you're not, they're fascinated by you, but only for a little while. And then they want to change you and crush you. And then they leave.

MARINA ABRAMOVIC

The Guardian, May 12, 2014

Tags: Marina Abramovic


As such portraits as we have are almost invariably of the male sex, who strut more prominently across the stage, it seems worthwhile to take as a model one of those many women who cluster in the shade. For a study of history and biography convinces any right minded person that these obscure figures occupy a place not unlike that of the showman's hand in the dance of the marionettes; and the finger is laid upon the heart.

VIRGINIA WOOLF

"Phyllis and Rosamond", The Complete Shorter Fiction of Virginia Woolf

Tags: Virginia Woolf


Any but the most brutish of men must be touched with a certain awe or wonder at the baring of a woman's naked soul.

ROBERT E. HOWARD

The Hour of the Dragon


You don't know a woman until you have had a letter from her.

ADA LEVERSON

Tenterhooks

Tags: Ada Leverson


Women ... have long been discouraged from the awareness and forthright expression of anger. Sugar and spice are the ingredients from which we are made. We are the nurturers, the soothers, the peacemakers, and the steadiers of rocked boats.

HARRIET LERNER

The Dance of Anger: A Woman's Guide to Changing the Patterns of Intimate Relationships

Tags: Harriet Lerner


This is woman's great benevolence, that she will become a martyr for beauty, so that the world may have pleasure.

ROBERT WILSON LYND

Irish & English: Portraits and Impressions

Tags: Robert Wilson Lynd


There are few virtuous women who are not tired of their part.

FRANÇOIS DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD

Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims

Tags: Francois de La Rochefoucauld


The spirit of Eve is strong in all her daughters.

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT

Rose in Bloom

Tags: Louisa May Alcott


The imaginative estimate or ideal conception of Woman by the Poets has always been deemed exceptionally interesting, especially by women themselves, for, as a rule, it is agreeable; and, even if the presentation be sometimes a little overcharged with glowing colour, all of us, men and women alike, are not otherwise than pleased with descriptions that portray us, not exactly as we are, but as we should like to be. Withal, a portrait, to obtain recognition, must have in it some resemblance to the original; and, speaking in the most prosaic manner, one need not hesitate to affirm that any representation of women, at least of womanly women, that was not attractive would be a travesty of the fact.

ALFRED AUSTIN

The Bridling of Pegasus

Tags: Alfred Austin