110+ Fran Lebowitz Quotes On Writing, New York And Witty

Fran Lebowitz is an American author and public speaker. She is best known for her sardonic social commentary on American life as expressed in her books and interviews. She is also known for her role in Martin Scorsese's documentary Public Speaking. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Fran Lebowitz on writing, love, new york.

Top 10 Fran Lebowitz Quotes

1. Think before you speak. Read before you think.
2. The conversational overachiever is someone whose grasp exceeds his reach. This is possible but not attractive.
3. My favorite animal is steak.
4. As a teenager you are at the last stage in your life when you will be happy to hear that the phone is for you.
5. A hobby is, of course, an abomination, as are all consuming interests and passions that do not lead directly to large, personal gain.
6. Children are the most desirable opponents at scrabble as they are both easy to beat and fun to cheat.
7. There are two modes of transport in Los Angeles: car and ambulance. Visitors who wish to remain inconspicuous are advised to choose the latter
8. Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying.
9. Original thought is like original sin: both happened before you were born to people you could not have possibly met.
10. If you removed all of the homosexuals and homosexual influence from what is generally regarded as American culture, you would pretty much be left with Let's Make a Deal.

Fran Lebowitz Image Quotes

Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Short Quotes

• London: A place you go to get bronchitis.
• A salad is not a meal, it is a style.
• The opposite of talking isn't listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.
• If you are a dog and your owner suggests that you wear a sweater suggest that he wear a tail.
• Contrary to popular opinion, the hustle is not a new dance step - it is an old business procedure.
• You're only as good as your last haircut.
• Being offended is a natural consequence of leaving the house.
• I doubt there's ever been a true thing said on Fox. Maybe the weather report, maybe not.
• Calling a taxi in Texas is like calling a rabbi in Iraq.
• Polite conversation is rarely either.

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About Writing

Very few people possess true artistic ability. It is therefore both unseemly and unproductive to irritate the situation by making an effort. If you have a burning, restless urge to write or paint, simply eat something sweet and the feeling will pass. — Fran Lebowitz

While clothes with pictures and/or writing on them are not entirely an invention of the modern age, they are an unpleasant indication of the general state of things. ... I mean, be realistic. If people don't want to listen to you, what makes you think they want to hear from your sweater? — Fran Lebowitz

Having been unpopular in high school is not just cause for book publications. — Fran Lebowitz

My dream writing room would be the Imperial Library in Vienna. — Fran Lebowitz

All the time I'm not writing I feel like a criminal. It's horrible to feel felonious every second of the day. It's much more relaxing to actually write. — Fran Lebowitz

Writing pornography is deadly, nothing duller. I mean a toll-taker has a more exciting life than a pornographer. — Fran Lebowitz

In conversation you can use timing, a look, an inflection. But on the page all you have is commas, dashes, the amount of syllables in a word. When I write, I read everything out loud to get the right rhythm. — Fran Lebowitz

It's much easier to write a solemn book than a funny book. It's harder to make people laugh than it is to make them cry. People are always on the verge of tears. — Fran Lebowitz

Most writers write too much. I have the exact opposite problem. I feel I could write almost anything in a paragraph. I have a natural ability to condense, and so I often think, "Are you kidding me? Five thousand words? How am I gonna make 5,000 words out of that?" — Fran Lebowitz

Whenever I am doing anything else, which is most of the time, even if it is not something like robbing a bank, I feel felonious. Writing is what I'm supposed to be doing. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About Love

Romantic love is mental illness. But it's a pleasurable one. It's a drug. It distorts reality, and that's the point of it. It would be impossible to fall in love with someone that you really saw. — Fran Lebowitz

I love being in love. I don't think anything compares with it, though I consider it very disruptive. — Fran Lebowitz

Romantic love is mental illness. But it's a pleasurable one. — Fran Lebowitz

I love sleep because it is both pleasant and safe to use. — Fran Lebowitz

The main symptom of falling in love is that you lose your intellectual prowess. — Fran Lebowitz

If you can stay in love for more than two years, you're on something. — Fran Lebowitz

While it is undeniably true that people love a surprise, it is equally true that they are seldom pleased to suddenly and without warning happen upon a series of prunes in what they took to be a normal loin of pork. — Fran Lebowitz

Smoking is, if not my life, then at least my hobby. I love to smoke. Smoking is fun. Smoking is cool. Smoking is, as far as I am concerned, the entire point of being an adult. — Fran Lebowitz

Ever since I was a little child, I refused to see movies of books that I loved. Because you already know what Heidi looks like and she doesn't look like Shirley Temple. — Fran Lebowitz

[Friendships] are easy to get out of compared to love affairs, but they are not easy to get out of compared to, say, jail. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About New York

When you leave New York, you are astonished at how clean the rest of the world is. Clean is not enough. — Fran Lebowitz

I am a New Yorker. I like New York. And I like cities. And it's not my desire to make New York more suburban. I would personally just like to vet each person. — Fran Lebowitz

The great thing about New Jersey is that it's close to New York. — Fran Lebowitz

I'd like to decide who comes here. I'd like to be the admissions director of New York. — Fran Lebowitz

I stopped taking drugs when I was 19, and who wants to drive a cab around New York with drugs in their car? — Fran Lebowitz

Because of the Internet everybody sees the same stuff. You can buy the clothes of New York, even if you're not living there. So I think that the accessibility, in this case, drives buying choices more than anything else. — Fran Lebowitz

If there were, say, only 10 percent of the hotels that exist now, there would be all these apartments for people who live in New York, as opposed to people visiting New York. And then all this junk in the theater, we would no longer need the kind of stuff that tourists like. — Fran Lebowitz

Without these tourists, New York would be fantastic. I don't want them to come. Stay home! — Fran Lebowitz

The other day I read that last year 58 million tourists came to New York ... where a puny eight million people are trying to live. Unless they own a hotel chain, I don't think a single one of these eight million people are happy about this. — Fran Lebowitz

I don't care if New York avoided bankruptcy by substituting tourism for the garment business. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About Life

Your life story would not make a good book. Don't even try. — Fran Lebowitz

Life is something to do when you can't get to sleep. — Fran Lebowitz

Life is something you do when you can't get to sleep. — Fran Lebowitz

Life is so absurd now that it is almost impossible to be a satirist in this era. — Fran Lebowitz

It is, in fact, safe to assume that, more often than not, life imitates craft, for who among us can say that our experience does not more closely resemble a macramé plant holder than it does a painting by Seurat. When it comes to art, life is the biggest copycat in the matter of the frame. — Fran Lebowitz

I, unfortunately, take the subway a lot. It's not my preference, but it is my lot in life. — Fran Lebowitz

Everything in Japan is hidden. Real life has an unlisted phone number. — Fran Lebowitz

Now the culture is made of old things, it's a collage. Art made out of art is not art. You're supposed to make art out of life. — Fran Lebowitz

A woman's quest in life should be to find the perfect apartment. And I have found the perfect apartment. The perfect apartment is the first floor of the Metropolitan Museum. With a sofa. — Fran Lebowitz

Citizen's Band radio renders one accessible to a wide variety of people from all walks of life. It should not be forgotten that all walks of life include conceptual artists, dry cleaners, and living poets. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About People

I place a high moral value on the way people behave. I find it repellent to have a lot, and to behave with anything other than courtesy in the old sense of the word - politeness of the heart, a gentleness of the spirit. — Fran Lebowitz

You sit or stand in the subway, and you look around - I do, because I don't have a phone so I'm not playing a game - and you see people. — Fran Lebowitz

The telephone is a good way to talk to people without having to offer them a drink. — Fran Lebowitz

Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine. — Fran Lebowitz

Inhabitants of underdeveloped nations and victims of natural disasters are the only people who have ever been happy to see soybeans. — Fran Lebowitz

If people had gavels, there would be no wars. If every person in the world had a gavel and could bang it and get everyone's attention right away and make their displeasure known, I believe the level of actual violence in the world would just disappear to practically nothing. — Fran Lebowitz

White grapes are very attractive but when it comes to dessert people generally like cake with icing. — Fran Lebowitz

It would also have been helpful to have gone to a Catholic grammar school. The only people who know grammar are those people who went to Catholic grammar school. Those nuns beat it into them. — Fran Lebowitz

Anti-smoking sentiment has replaced middle-class morality entirely. The smoker has taken the place of the homosexual. Today you hear people say things about smokers that used to be said about homosexuals - they pollute the environment; you don't want them around your children. — Fran Lebowitz

You can't go around hoping that most people have sterling moral characters. The most you can hope for is that people will pretend that they do. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About Child

Educational television should be absolutely forbidden. It can only lead to unreasonable disappointment when your child discovers that the letters of the alphabet do not leap up out of books and dance around with royal-blue chickens. — Fran Lebowitz

How do you know if your child is a writer? Your obstetrician holds his stethoscope to your abdomen and only hears excuses. — Fran Lebowitz

Do not, on a rainy day, ask your child what he feels like doing, because I assure you that what he feels like doing, you won't feel like watching. — Fran Lebowitz

Being poor is like being a child. Being rich is like being an adult: you get to do whatever you want. Everyone is nice when they have to be; rich people are nice when they feel like it. — Fran Lebowitz

I used to love to write. As a child I used to write all the time. I loved to write up until the second I got my first professional writing job. It turns out it's not that I hate to write. I hate, simply, to work. — Fran Lebowitz

I must take issue with the term 'a mere child,' for it has been my invariable experience that the company of a mere child is infinitely preferable to that of a mere adult. — Fran Lebowitz

Never allow your child to call you by your first name. He hasn't known you long enough. — Fran Lebowitz

If you are truly serious abut preparing your child for the future, don't teach him to subtract teach him to deduct. — Fran Lebowitz

Any child who cannot do long division by himself does not deserve to smoke. — Fran Lebowitz

No one's supposed to be the president. This is not England. And it's not just the Bush family, all families designate each child as having some particular trait. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About Children

Even when freshly washed and relieved of all obvious confections, children tend to be sticky. — Fran Lebowitz

Children ask better questions than adults. "May I have a cookie?" "Why is the sky blue?" and "What does a cow say?" are far more likely to elicit a cheerful response than "Where's your manuscript?" "Why haven't you called?" and "Who's your lawyer?" — Fran Lebowitz

Designer clothes worn by children are like snowsuits worn by adults. Few can carry it off successfully. — Fran Lebowitz

Notoriously insensitive to subtle shifts in mood, children will persist in discussing the color of a recently sighted cement-mixer long after one's own interest in the topic has waned. — Fran Lebowitz

Don't bother discussing sex with small children. They rarely have anything to add. — Fran Lebowitz

Take away a man's actual sense of manhood - which is conventionally based on the ability to work, to earn money, to be self-sufficient, to provide for children - and you've got to give them something else. And they did. — Fran Lebowitz

All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact, barely presentable. — Fran Lebowitz

Do not elicit your child's political opinions. He doesn't know any more than you do. — Fran Lebowitz

Children are rarely in the position to lend one a truly interesting sum of money. There are, however, exceptions, and such children are an excellent addition to any party. — Fran Lebowitz

If you don't have children and you don't have a job, you have time for friendship ... People who have jobs are not the best friends to have. It's better to be friends with people who are unemployed. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Quotes About Food

Food is an important part of a balanced diet. — Fran Lebowitz

The downfall of most diets is that they restrict your intake of food. — Fran Lebowitz

Vegetables are interesting but lack a sense of purpose when unaccompanied by a good cut of meat. — Fran Lebowitz

If you're going to America, bring your own food. — Fran Lebowitz

Breakfast cereals that come in the same colors as polyester leisure suits make oversleeping a virtue. — Fran Lebowitz

Cold soup is a very tricky thing and it is a rare hostess who can carry it off. More often than not the dinner guest is left with the impression that had he only come a little earlier he could have gotten it while it was still hot. — Fran Lebowitz

Large, naked, raw carrots are acceptable as food only to those who live in hutches eagerly awaiting Easter. — Fran Lebowitz

Civilised adults do not take apple juice with dinner. — Fran Lebowitz

Frenchman: Germans with good food. — Fran Lebowitz

A great many people in Los Angeles are on special diets that restrict their intake of synthetic foods. The reason for this appears to be a widely held belief that organically grown fruits and vegetables make the cocaine work faster. — Fran Lebowitz

Fran Lebowitz Famous Quotes And Sayings

Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying. — Fran Lebowitz

Nature is by and large to be found out of doors, a location where, it cannot be argued, there are never enough comfortable chairs. — Fran Lebowitz

My favorite way to wake up is to have a certain French movie star whisper to me softly at two-thirty in the afternoon that if I want to get to Sweden in time to pick up my Nobel Prize for Literature, I had better ring for breakfast. This occurs rather less often than one might wish. — Fran Lebowitz

Tolerance is really a better thing than understanding. Because it doesn't agitate against human nature. — Fran Lebowitz

I never took hallucinogenic drugs because I never wanted my consciousness expanded one unnecessary iota. — Fran Lebowitz

There is no such thing as inner peace. There is only nervousness or death. Any attempt to prove otherwise constitutes unacceptable behavior. — Fran Lebowitz

Japanese food is very pretty and undoubtedly a suitable cuisine in Japan, which is largely populated by people of below average size. Hostesses hell-bent on serving such food to occidentals would be well advised to supplement it with something more substantial and to keep in mind that almost everybody likes french fries. — Fran Lebowitz

In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country, capitalism triumphed over democracy. — Fran Lebowitz

Radio news is bearable. This is due to the fact that while the news is being broadcast, the disk jockey is not allowed to talk. — Fran Lebowitz

Think before you speak. Read before you think. This will give you something to think about that you didn't make up yourself - a wise move at any age, but most especially at seventeen, when you are in the greatest danger of coming to annoying conclusions. — Fran Lebowitz

I love sleep because it is both pleasant and safe to use. Pleasant because one is in the best possible company and safe because sleep is the consummate protection against the unseemliness that is the invariable consequence of being awake. What you don't know won't hurt you. Sleep is death without the responsibility. — Fran Lebowitz

Humility is no substitute for a good personality. — Fran Lebowitz

I do not believe in God. I believe in cashmere. — Fran Lebowitz

Violet will be a good color for hair at just about the same time that brunette becomes a good color for flowers. — Fran Lebowitz

Abandon the search for Truth; settle for a good fantasy — Fran Lebowitz

I'm not interested in being a wife. I'm interested in being an empress. — Fran Lebowitz

That I am totally devoid of sympathy for, or interest in, the world of groups is directly attributable to the fact that my two greatest needs and desires - smoking cigarettes and plotting revenge - are basically solitary pursuits. — Fran Lebowitz

I do not think everyone is created equal. In fact, I know they're not. [The Constitution] means that everyone should have the same laws as everyone else. It doesn't mean that everyone's as smart or as cute or as lucky as everyone else. — Fran Lebowitz

My desire to curtail undue freedom of speech extends only to such public areas as restaurants, airports, streets, hotel lobbies, parks, and department stores. Verbal exchanges between consenting adults in private are as of little interest to me as they probably are to them. — Fran Lebowitz

Middle class was defined by having certain values and only a certain amount of money. But this new middle class seems to have absolutely no values and an unlimited amount of money. — Fran Lebowitz

If in addition to being physically unattractive you find that you do not get along well with others, do not under any circumstances attempt to alleviate this situation by developing an interesting personality. An interesting personality, is, in an adult, insufferable. In a teenager it is frequently punishable by law. — Fran Lebowitz

Being a woman is of special interest only to aspiring male transsexuals. To actual women, it is simply a good excuse not to play football. — Fran Lebowitz

If you are of the opinion that the contemplation of suicide is sufficient evidence of a poetic nature, do not forget that actions speak louder than words. — Fran Lebowitz

Albert Einstein didn't care where he lived. Albert Einstein was a genius. Albert Einstein wasn't getting lost in the master bedroom, he was lost in thought. — Fran Lebowitz

I believe in talent. I know you're not supposed to believe in that anymore because you're supposed to believe if you just work hard you can do anything. That's how you succeed, maybe. But talent is something you're born with. You cannot acquire it by working hard, and you cannot lose it by lying around either. — Fran Lebowitz

To put it rather bluntly, I am not the type who wants to go back to the land; I am the type who wants to go back to the hotel. — Fran Lebowitz

The only appropriate response to the question, 'Can I be frank?' is, 'Yes, if I can be Barbara. — Fran Lebowitz

Andy Warhol made fame more famous. — Fran Lebowitz

Why not have your first baby at sixty, when your husband is already dead and your career is over? Then you can really devote yourself to it. — Fran Lebowitz

Success didn't spoil me, I've always been insufferable. — Fran Lebowitz

If you read a lot, nothing is as great as you've imagined. Venice is - Venice is better. — Fran Lebowitz

The most common error made in matters of appearance is the belief that one should disdain the superficial and let the true beauty of one's soul shine through. If there are places on your body where this is a possibility, you are not attractive -- you are leaking. — Fran Lebowitz

Marriage entitles women to the protection of a strong man who will steady the stepladder while they paint the kitchen ceiling. — Fran Lebowitz

Any artist who has that quality of timelessness has that quality because they tell the truth. — Fran Lebowitz

If your sexual fantasies were truly of interest to others, they would no longer be fantasies. — Fran Lebowitz

A community is a butcher and a doctor, a minister, a town troublemaker. A "community" is not a bunch of people united by some grievance. That's just self-righteousness - incredibly dangerous and antidemocratic. — Fran Lebowitz

Your grandparents did not endure the indignities of a steerage journey to Ellis Island so that you could stand outside a discothèque and beg a wallpaper designer to take you in with him. — Fran Lebowitz

Democracy is an interesting, even laudable, notion and there is no question but that when compared to Communism, which is too dull, or Fascism, which is too exciting, it emerges as the most palatable form of government. — Fran Lebowitz

The first people who died of AIDS were artists. They were the most interesting people. — Fran Lebowitz

I'm a horrible girlfriend. I always was. I'm great at the beginning, because I can be very romantic. — Fran Lebowitz

Perhaps one of the more noteworthy trends of our time is the occupation of buildings accompanied by the taking of hostages. The perpetrators of these deeds are generally motivated by political grievance, social injustice, and the deeply felt desire to see how they look on TV. — Fran Lebowitz

Whenever someone accuses someone of being a racist - which is rare, you have to admit, considering how much racism there is - there is an incredible outrage. I realized that we live in an environment that it seems to be worse to call someone a racist than to be one. — Fran Lebowitz

Life Lessons by Fran Lebowitz

1. Fran Lebowitz teaches us to be confident in our own opinions and to speak up for what we believe in.
2. She also encourages us to be open-minded and to accept and embrace diversity in all its forms.
3. Finally, she reminds us to be honest and to always strive to be the best version of ourselves.