Top 300 Fran Lebowitz Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Think before you speak. Read before you think.”

— Fran Lebowitz

2. “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

3. “Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine.”

— Fran Lebowitz

4. “I’m very lazy, I hate to work.”

— Fran Lebowitz

5. “No one earns $100 million. You steal $100 million.”

— Fran Lebowitz

6. “If people don’t hold grudges, it means they just don’t care what people do.”

— Fran Lebowitz

7. “You’re only as good as your last haircut.”

— Fran Lebowitz

8. “Being offended is a natural consequence of leaving the house.”

— Fran Lebowitz

9. “The opposite of talking isn’t listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.”

— Fran Lebowitz

10. “There is no such thing as inner peace. There is only nervousness and death.”

— Fran Lebowitz

11. “I hate writing. I will do anything to avoid it. The only way I could write less was if I was dead.”

— Fran Lebowitz

12. “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

13. “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

14. “When Toni Morrison said ‘write the book you want to read,’ she didn’t mean everybody.”

— Fran Lebowitz

15. “Food is an important part of a balanced diet.”

— Fran Lebowitz

16. “A salad is not a meal, it is a style.”

— Fran Lebowitz

17. “If thine enemy offend thee, give his child a drum.”

— Fran Lebowitz

18. “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.”

— Fran Lebowitz

19. “I hate money. It is boring and it is arithmetic. The two things I hate the most.”

— Fran Lebowitz

20. “Life is something that happens when you can’t get to sleep.”

— Fran Lebowitz

21. “Donald Trump is not my fault. You can blame certain things on me, but not Donald Trump.”

— Fran Lebowitz

22. “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

23. “I do not believe in God. I believe in cashmere.”

— Fran Lebowitz

24. “There are too many books. The books are terrible. And this is because you have been taught to have self-esteem.”

— Fran Lebowitz

25. “I write so slowly, I could write with my own blood and not hurt myself.”

— Fran Lebowitz

26. “I never wanted to have any extra money, if it meant having to have any extra work.”

— Fran Lebowitz

27. “All God’s children are not beautiful. Most of God’s children are, in fact, barely presentable.”

— Fran Lebowitz

28. “In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country, capitalism triumphed over democracy.”

— Fran Lebowitz

29. “Randomness scares people. Religion is a way to explain randomness.”

— Fran Lebowitz

30. “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

31. “Contrary to popular opinion, the hustle is not a new dance step – it is an old business procedure.”

— Fran Lebowitz

32. “Any child who cannot do long division by himself does not deserve to smoke.”

— Fran Lebowitz

33. “If you read a lot, nothing is as great as you’ve imagined. Venice is – Venice is better.”

— Fran Lebowitz

34. “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

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35. “Humility is no substitute for a good personality.”

— Fran Lebowitz

36. “Spilling your guts is just exactly as charming as it sounds.”

— Fran Lebowitz

37. “I think one manifestation of integrity is holding a grudge. Saying no is a little different. Holding a grudge is the modern equivalent of having standards.”

— Fran Lebowitz

38. “In real life, I assure you, there is no such thing as algebra.”

— Fran Lebowitz

39. “When it comes to sports I am not particularly interested. Generally speaking, I look upon them as dangerous and tiring activities performed by people with whom I share nothing except the right to trial by jury.”

— Fran Lebowitz

40. “Generally speaking, the poorer person summers where he winters.”

— Fran Lebowitz

41. “When someone asks, ‘Why do you think he’s not calling me?’ there’s always one answer – ‘He’s not interested.’ There’s not ever any other answer.”

— Fran Lebowitz

42. “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

43. “A book is not supposed to be a mirror. It’s supposed to be a door.”

— Fran Lebowitz

44. “China is not a great idea: capitalism and a dictator. It’s like the two worst possible things you could imagine together. It’s a very bad idea.”

— Fran Lebowitz

45. “I write a sentence a thousand times, changing it all the time to look at it in different ways.”

— Fran Lebowitz

46. “Your responsibility as a parent is never great as the case is with the mother.”

— Fran Lebowitz

47. “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

48. “You don’t have to lay an egg to know if it tastes good.”

— Fran Lebowitz

49. “I’m like the laziest person who ever lived. It’s amazing to me I even sit up.”

— Fran Lebowitz

50. “If you are a dog and your owner suggests that you wear a sweater suggest that he wear a tail.”

— Fran Lebowitz