WOMEN QUOTES XXIV

quotations about women

Your anatomy is a mystery that nobody bothers explaining to us. Even when we think we have mastered one woman's body, every body is different.

CHRIS ABANI

"What Men Aren't Telling Us", O Magazine, July 2008

Tags: Chris Abani


He who desires a lifetime of happiness with a beautiful woman desires to enjoy the taste of wine by keeping his mouth always full of it.

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

Maxims for Revolutionists


In oranges and women courage is often mistaken for insanity.

SALLY ROBINSON

Iron Jawed Angels

Tags: courage


Women are leaders everywhere you look--from the CEO who runs a Fortune 500 company to the housewife who raises her children and heads her household. Our country was built by strong women and we will continue to break down walls and defy stereotypes.

NANCY PELOSI

Glamour Magazine, January 2007

Tags: Nancy Pelosi


A woman does not spend all her time in buying things; she spends part of it in taking them back.

EDGAR WATSON HOWE

Country Town Sayings


The only way to win a wench is not to woo her; the only way to have her fast is to have her loose.

THOMAS DEKKER

Blurt, Master Constable


Women complain about premenstrual syndrome, but I think of it as the only time of the month that I can be myself.

ROSEANNE BARR

attributed, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Health Fair

Tags: Roseanne Barr


Women, you overheated dipsomaniacs, never passing up a chance to wangle a drink, a great boon to bartenders but a bane to us--not to mention our crockery and our woolens!

ARISTOPHANES

Women at the Thesmophoria

Tags: Aristophanes


In the choice of a wife, we ought to make use of our ears, and not our eyes.

WELLINS CALCOTT

Thoughts Moral and Divine

Tags: Wellins Calcott


What, then, is feminine as contrasted with masculine? what is womanly as compared with manly, whether in literature or in life? Men and women have many qualities in common, and resemble more than they differ from each other. But while, speaking generally, the man's main occupations lie abroad, the woman's main occupation is at home. He has to deal with public and collective interests; she has to do with private and individual interests. We need not go so far as to say, with Kingsley, that man must work and woman must weep; but at least he has to fight and to struggle, she has to solace and to heal. Ambition, sometimes high, sometimes low, but still ambition--ambition and success are the main motives and purpose of his life. Her noblest ambition is to foster domestic happiness, to bring comfort to the afflicted, and to move with unostentatious but salutary step over the vast territory of human affection. While man busies himself with the world of politics, with the world of commerce, with the rise and fall of empires, with the fortunes and fate of humanity, woman tends the hearth, visits the sick, consoles the suffering--in a word, in all she does, fulfils the sacred offices of love.

ALFRED AUSTIN

The Bridling of Pegasus

Tags: Alfred Austin


Women are cats ... and love to scratch even those they're fond of. Sometimes the more they love them the harder they scratch.

WILLIAM JOHN LOCKE

Septimus

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The woman who thinks meanly of herself is any man's purchase.

SAMUEL RICHARDSON

Pamela

Tags: Samuel Richardson


A man, at least, is free; he can explore every passion, every land, overcome obstacles, taste the most distant pleasures. But a woman is continually thwarted. Inert and pliant at the same time, she must struggle against both the softness of her flesh and subjection to the law. Her will, like the veil tied to her hat by a string, flutters with every breeze; there is always some desire luring her on, some convention holding her back.

GUSTAVE FLAUBERT

Madame Bovary

Tags: Gustave Flaubert


The beauty of a woman transcends all other forms of beauty, as well in the sweetness of its suggestions, as in the fervor of the admiration it awakens. The beauty of a lovely woman is an inspiration, a sweet delirium, a gentle madness. Her looks are love-potions. Heaven itself is never so clearly revealed to us as in the face of a beautiful woman.

CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE

Intuitions and Summaries of Thought


A woman is essentially a vessel made to be filled.

JOSÉ SARAMAGO

Baltasar and Blimunda

Tags: José Saramago


Women have been called queens for a long time, but the kingdom given them isn't worth ruling.

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT

An Old-Fashioned Girl


A goodlookin horse is like a goodlookin woman.... They're always more trouble than what they're worth. What a man needs is just one that will get the job done.

CORMAC MCCARTHY

All the Pretty Horses


A woman with a voice is by definition a strong woman. But the search to find that voice can be remarkably difficult.

MELINDA GATES

Woman's Day Magazine, October 2, 2007

Tags: Melinda Gates


According to usage and conventions which are at last being questioned but have by no means been overcome, the social presence of a woman is different in kind from that of a man. A man's presence is dependent upon the promise of power which he embodies.... A man's presence suggests what he is capable of doing to you or for you. His presence may be fabricated, in the sense that he pretends to b capable of what he is not. But the pretence is always towards a power which he exercises on others. By contrast, a woman's presence expresses her own attitude to herself, and defines what can and cannot be done to her.

JOHN BERGER

Ways of Seeing

Tags: John Berger


If you tell anything to a woman ... it's like putting it in the papers.

IVAN KLIMA

Waiting for the Dark, Waiting for the Light

Tags: Ivan Klima