quotations about men
Man is nothing but surprise, contradiction, incoherence, and folly.
OCTAVE MIRBEAU
The Diary of a Chambermaid
There is so much that is deaf and dumb in man, and so much that is paralyzed, so much that is shrunken, that nothing short of a miraculous touch of re-creation can make them at death perfect beings.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Living with boys has changed the way I see men. I used to love them in spite of themselves. I've come to love them because of themselves. Collectively, they can be assholes. But so can women, given the same chance. Anyone who thinks estrogen is the antidote for brutality has neither paid much attention to history nor taken an eighth grade girls' gym class. Men may have sins against female kind to atone for, but being born male is not one of them.
KYRAN PITTMAN
Planting Dandelions
Men, like musical instruments, seem made to be played upon.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
If the world were a logical place, men would ride side saddle.
RITA MAE BROWN
Sudden Death
What woman would not gladly perform a painful pilgrimage, if so she could but find her Jove, and then fall down and worship him! Alas! the actual Jupiters are very scarce.
MARY CLEMMER AMES
Outlines of Men, Women, and Things
Man, if he compare himself with all that he can see, is at the zenith of power; but if he compare himself with all that he can conceive, he is at the nadir of weakness.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
If Man be the Index or Epitomy of the World, as Philosophers tell us, we have only to read our selves well to be learned in it.
WILLIAM PENN
Some Fruits of Solitude
Even in hell, if a man was a man, you'd know it.
STEPHEN VINCENT BENET
"The Devil and Daniel Webster"
All men seemed to be self-serving, selfish, insensitive pigs, just waiting for an opportunity to act like greater self-serving, selfish, insensitive pigs.
DAN SIMMONS
Ilium
If it be true that God and man are in one image or likeness (and the affirmation that they are so is not unplausible) then it is the duty of man to bring out into its full splendor that Divine Image which is latent, on one side, in the complexity of his own nature.
WILLIAM BATCHELDER GREENE
The Blazing Star
But that is how men are! Ungrateful and never satisfied. When you don't have them they hate you because you won't; and when you do have them they hate you again, for some other reason. Or for no reason at all, except that they are discontented children, and can't be satisfied whatever they get, let a woman do what she may.
D. H. LAWRENCE
Lady Chatterley's Lover
Man, unlike anything organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond his work, walks up the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his accomplishments.
JOHN STEINBECK
The Grapes of Wrath
Testosterone is a great equalizer, it turns all men into morons.
RUPERT GILES
"The Pack", Buffy the Vampire Slayer
A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes.
MAHATMA GANDHI
Ethical Religion
Most women use more brains picking a horse in the third at Belmont than they do picking a husband.
LAUREN BACALL
How to Marry a Millionaire
Men never try to pass themselves off for that which they are not, unless they expect to accomplish something desirable thereby.
J. B. RIPLEY
Plain Words to Young Men
Men are not taught how to be lovers, to be expressive, to share, to show affection, and to become companions. As do all human beings, men have the capacity to love, but this capacity is not developed.... Because men are taught how to be workers and to be bosses, their gender identities do not respect their feminine sides.
IAN M. HARRIS
Messages Men Hear: Constructing Masculinities
I sometimes think that God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated His ability.
OSCAR WILDE
The Wit of Oscar Wilde
Create that good, solid foundation, and the man who comes into your life can be that delicious icing.
NORA ROBERTS
interview, inReads, October 5, 2011