Parody Quotes

“Hey," said Shadow. "Huginn or Muninn, or whoever you are."
The bird turned, head tipped, suspiciously, on one side, and it stared at him with bright eyes.
"Say 'Nevermore,'" said Shadow.
"Fuck you," said the raven.”
― Neil Gaiman, American Gods

“Sorry," [Hamlet] said, rubbing his temples. "I don't know what came over me. All of a sudden I had this overwhelming desire to talk for a very long time without actually doing anything.”
― Jasper Fforde, Something Rotten

“If smart people are parodying it, that's a sure sign that some less smart people are believing it.”
― David Levithan, Every Day

“A totally nondenominational prayer: Insofar as I may be heard by anything, which may or may not care what I say, I ask, if it matters, that I be forgiven for anything I may have done or failed to do which requires forgiveness.  Conversely, if not forgiveness but something else may be required to insure any possible benefit for which I may be eligible after the destruction of my body, I ask that this, whatever it may be, be granted or withheld, as the case may be, in such a manner as to insure said benefit. I ask this in my capacity as your elected intermediary between yourself and that which may not be yourself, but which may have an interest in the matter of your receiving as much as it is possible for you to receive of this thing, and which may in some way be influenced by this ceremony. Amen.”
― Roger Zelazny, Creatures of Light and Darkness

“How much truth is contained in something can be best determined by making it thoroughly laughable and then watching to see how much joking around it can take. For truth is a matter that can withstand mockery, that is freshened by any ironic gesture directed at it. Whatever cannot withstand satire is false.”
― Peter Sloterdijk, Critique of Cynical Reason

“You see, writers traveling to Southeast Asia visit indigenous communities. No writing quest will be complete without some cross-cultural comparisons. This exercise is a decisive moment in every author’s life. Equate it to a photographer meeting his first old man with a wrinkled face or the old lady with heavy earrings dangling from her earlobes.”
― Merlin Franco, Saint Richard Parker

“Satire is a lesson, parody is a game.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Strong Opinions

“There is something immensely scary about putting yourself out there for people to love or hate you, fan or pan you, review or screw you.”
― L.V. Lewis, Fifty Shades of Jungle Fever

“Monsters are getting more uppity, too (...) I heard where this guy, he killed this monster in this lake, no problem, stuck its arm up over the door (...) and you know what? Its mum come and complained. Its actual mum come right down to the hall next day and complained. Actually complained. That's the respect you get.”
― Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!

“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. It was the future, and everything sucked.”
― Greg Nagan, The 5-Minute Iliad and Other Instant Classics: Great Books For The Short Attention Span

“Some people fight fire with fire. I've found water to be more effective.”
― Adrianne Ambrose, Confessions of a Virgin Sacrifice

“With good parody, you have to be smarter that the people you’re parodying.”
― Craig ferguson

“I took the one letter he had for us. It was from the Switchblade Gas & Electric Company. I didn't know I had admirers there too, but I wasn't that surprised. I threw it in the trash with the IRS's love letters and closed the door without reply.”
― The Harvard Lampoon, Nightlight

“Alice is fictional. This isn't.”
― Jess C. Scott, Zombie Mania: A Zombie Apocalypse Parody

“Captain Smek himself appeared on television for an official speech to humankind.
[...] 'Noble Savages of Earth,' he said. 'Long time we have tried to live together in peace.' (It had been five months.) 'Long time have the Boov suffered under the hostileness and intolerableness of you people. With sad hearts I now concede that Boov and humans will never to exist as one.'
I remember being really excited at this point. Could I possibly be hearing right? Were the Boov about to leave? I was so stupid.
'And so now I generously grant you Human Preserves - gifts of land that will be for humans forever, never to be taken away again, now.'
[...] So that's when we Americans were given Florida. One state for three hundred million people. There were going to be some serious lines for the bathrooms.”
― Adam Rex, The True Meaning of Smekday

“I learned that it's okay to feel the way I do: that my life has no meaning unless I have a boyfriend. A real man is like the perfect vampire-boy and all the perfect guys in Twue Wuv.”
― Jess C. Scott, Literary Heroin (Gluttony): A Twilight Parody

“History, lie of our lives, mire of our loins. Our sins, our souls. Hiss-tih-ree: the tip of the pen taking a trip of three steps (with one glide) down the chronicle to trap a slick, sibilant character. Hiss. (Ss.) Tih. Ree.

He was a pig, a plain pig, in the morning, standing five feet ten on one hoof. He was a pig in slacks. He was a pig in school. He was a pig on the dotted line. But in my eyes it’s always the ones signing dotted lines that become pigs.

Did this pig have a precursor? He did, indeed he did. In point of fact, dating all the way back to the Biblical Age. Oh where? About everywhere you look there's pigs giving that fancy ol’ snake a chase. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you can always count on a fuckin’ pretentious sarcastican for a fancy prose style.”
― Brian Celio, Catapult Soul

“I don't believe in virgin sacrifice. It encourages promiscuity at an early age”
― Adrianne Ambrose, Confessions of a Virgin Sacrifice

“In the land of sour grapes, the half-eaten apple is the queen”
― Katerina Stoykova Klemer

“All families are silly in their own way.”
― Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty

“Hell, if someome wrote a book about you, well, it'd sell a million copies the day it was released. And if someone else was clever enough to write a parody - you know, to privide som comic relief during these extremely difficult economic times - that would probably be an even bigger seller, or at least it shoud be. So, just come clean with me, Ed. Your secret's safe with me, and whoever reads my internet blog. You...are...a...vampire!”
― Stephen Jenner, Twilite: A Parody

“And don't trouble yourself too much if you don't laugh at what you are about to read, for if you perk up your pink little ear, you may hear the silvery tinkling of merriment in the air, far, far away . . . . It's us, buster. Ching!”
― Harvard Lampoon, Bored of the Rings: A Parody of J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings

“Oh, I don’t mean to infer that you’re not a great guy. I’m sure you’re the exception to the rule.”
― Jaye Frances, The Cruise - All That Glitters

“...heaven wouldn’t be like this earth, this tormented earth ruled by evil forces that tossed humanity to and fro like a slow clown in a two-bit rodeo.”
― Joe LaFlam, My Fear Lady

“Not all of Derrida's writing is to everyone's taste. He had an irritating habit of overusing the rhetorical question, which lends itself easily to parody: 'What is it, to speak? How can I even speak of this? Who is this "I" who speaks of speaking?”
― Terry Eagleton

“Cashewblai Pecan was a mighty conqueror, much as his grandsire Genghis had been.
Under his yasa, all roadways were safe for travelers and honest men.
‘Twas by many a wise tongue said,
That a maiden with a golden vessel on her head,
Might walk alone without fear or dread.
From the great eastern sea all the way to Mesopotamia,
Such was the promise of the Pax Macadamia!”
― Daniel Thorman, The Zodiac Quest: A LitRPG Adventure

“She who fights and runs away, may live to cower another day!”
― Daniel Thorman, The Zodiac Quest: A LitRPG Adventure

“There is no such thing as worthy and unworthy – there is only the throne and those too weak to sit on it.”
― Sid Ishun, Harry Windzor and the Stone of Scone: A Potter Parody and Prince Harry Satire

“Reimagine 2025 by Stewart Stafford

Imagine no Viagra,
Put yourself at ease,
Flags at half-mast, limp,
No one worthy to please.

Imagine no more Temu,
It’s costly if you try,
No tacky deals to tempt us,
Prices rocketing sky-high.

Imagine all the suckers,
Chasing Black Friday deals —
Whoa.

You don’t pay for illegal streaming,
First, it works and then it’s gone,
I hope someday Hollywood joins us,
And binge-watchers will live as one.

Imagine all your neighbours,
Squatters on your Wi-Fi?
Why?

Imagine no porch pirates,
I wonder if Jeff Bezos can?
No toilet paper gold rush,
A calmer state of Man.

You may say we're screen-addicted,
Babies swiping, having "fun",
Messiahs made of viral nonsense,
Pull the plug and we are done!

© 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”
― Stewart Stafford

“Do you see that? That stream of lava flowing out of you?”
― Erin Mallon, These Walls Can Talk