Top 300 Fran Lebowitz Quotes (2025 Update)

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

— Fran Lebowitz

Featured in: Quotes About Books And Reading, Short Quotes, Personality Quotes, Quotes About Thinking, Witty Quotes

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

13. “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

14. “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

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

19. “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

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

23. “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

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

32. “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

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

36. “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

Featured in: Fun Quotes

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

39. “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

40. “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

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

— Fran Lebowitz

42. “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

43. “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

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. “Success didn’t spoil me, I’ve always been insufferable.”

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

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

— Fran Lebowitz

49. “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

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

— Fran Lebowitz