Malcolm Anderson > Malcolm's Quotes

“Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere words! Was there anything so real as words?”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between.”
― Oscar Wilde

“There are moments when one has to choose between living one's own life, fully, entirely, completely-or dragging out some false, shallow, degrading existence that the world in its hypocrisy demands.”
― Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan

“Society often forgives the criminal; it never forgives the dreamer.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“The public have an insatiable curiosity to know everything, except what is worth knowing.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man Under Socialism and Selected Critical Prose

“An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.”
― Oscar Wilde

“I may not agree with you, but I will defend to the death your right to make an ass of yourself.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Men always want to be a woman’s first love. That is their clumsy vanity. We women have a more subtle instinct about these things. What (women) like is to be a man’s last romance.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Paradoxically though it may seem, it is none the less true that life imitates art far more than art imitates life.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is by far the best ending for one.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“The nicest feeling in the world is to do a good deed anonymously-and have somebody find out.”
― Oscar Wilde

“The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what Fiction means.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest

“Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is always from the noblest motives.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.”
― Oscar Wilde

“I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life mysterious or marvelous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if only one hides it.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“The basis of optimism is sheer terror.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“They've promised that dreams can come true - but forgot to mention that nightmares are dreams, too.”
― Oscar Wilde

“In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it. (Mr. Dumby, Act III)”
― Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan

“Yes, death. Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no to-morrow. To forget time, to forget life, to be at peace. You can help me. You can open for me the portals of death's house, for love is always with you, and love is stronger than death is.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Canterville Ghost

“Hear no evil, speak no evil, and you won't be invited to cocktail parties.”
― Oscar Wilde

“The public is wonderfully tolerant. It forgives everything except genius.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Artist as Critic: Critical Writings of Oscar Wilde

“A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Critic As Artist: With Some Remarks on the Importance of Doing Nothing and Discussing Everything

“I never put off till tomorrow what I can possibly do - the day after.”
― Oscar Wilde

“This wallpaper is dreadful, one of us will have to go.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Yet each man kills the thing he loves,
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!

Some kill their love when they are young,
And some when they are old;
Some strangle with the hands of Gold:
The kindest use a knife, because
The dead so soon grow cold.

Some love too little, some too long,
Some sell and others buy;
Some do the deed with many tears,
And some without a sigh:
For each man kills the thing he loves,
Yet each man does not die.”
― Oscar Wilde, Selected Poems of Oscar Wilde including the Ballad of Reading Gaol

“She is all the great heroines of the world in one. She is more than an individual. I love her, and I must make her love me. I want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to hear our laughter, and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. ”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“I don’t say we all ought to misbehave. But we ought to look as if we could”
― Oscar Wilde

“Music makes one feel so romantic - at least it always gets on one's nerves - which is the same thing nowadays.”
― Oscar Wilde

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.”
― Oscar Wilde