Top 500 Kurt Vonnegut Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Beautiful Quotes, Pain Quotes

2. “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Life Quotes, Personality Quotes, Fiction Quotes, Identity Quotes, Wisdom Quotes

3. “And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Life Quotes, Positive Inspirational Quotes, Feel Good Quotes, Positive Life Quotes, Affirmation Quotes

4. “I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can’t see from the center.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Short Quotes About Life, Fiction Quotes, Boldness Quotes, Risk-Taking Quotes

5. “Science is magic that works.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Funny Quotes

6. “The only proof he needed for the existence of God was music.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Music Quotes

7. “We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Short Quotes About Life, Beautiful Quotes, Risk-Taking Quotes, Creative Quotes

8. “If you want to break the rules of grammar, first learn the rules of grammar.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Witty Quotes, Firsts Quotes

9. “To practice any art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow. So do it.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Self-Worth Quotes, Fulfillment Quotes, Practice Quotes, Soul Quotes, Art Quotes

10. “God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Empathy Quotes, Morality Quotes, Values Quotes, Compassion Quotes

11. “To be is to do – Socrates To do is to be – Sartre Do Be Do Be Do – Sinatra.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

12. “I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anybody tell you different.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Funny Quotes, Silly Quotes, Different Quotes, Joy Quotes

13. “If you can do no good, at least do no harm.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

14. “And a step backward, after making a wrong turn, is a step in the right direction.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Journey Quotes, Decision-Making Quotes, Path Quotes, Responsibility Quotes, Mistake Quotes

15. “Everything is nothing, with a twist.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

16. “Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before. He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Hard Work Quotes, Fear Quotes, Ignorance Quotes

17. “No moral value is greater than humanity.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Quotes About Humanity

18. “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

19. “Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Creativity Quotes, Be Yourself Quotes, Fulfillment Quotes, Happy Monday Quotes

20. “Here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. There is no why.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Hipster Quotes

21. “Unannounced changes in life’s itinerary are like dancing lessons from God.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

22. “The secret to success in any human endeavor is total concentration.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

23. “Music is, to me, proof of the existence of God.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

24. “Those who believe in telekinetics, raise my hand.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Sarcastic Quotes

25. “Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Character Quotes

26. “Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder ‘why, why, why?’ Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land; Man got to tell himself he understand.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

27. “A sane person to an insane society must appear insane.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

28. “Be fruitful, and multiply.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

29. “Being a Humanist means trying to behave decently without expectation of rewards or punishment after you are dead.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Humanism Quotes

30. “True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Humor Quotes, Country Quotes

31. “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Silly Quotes, Affirmation Quotes, Satisfaction Quotes, Happy Friday Quotes

32. “Laughing is good exercise. It’s like jogging on the inside.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Exercise Quotes, Quotes About Laughing

33. “All moments, past, present and future, always have existed, always will exist.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Past Quotes

34. “Future generations will look back on TV as the lead in the water pipes that slowly drove the Romans mad.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

35. “Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

36. “You were sick, but now you’re well again, and there’s work to do.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

37. “The America I love still exists at the front desks of our public libraries.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Library Quotes

38. “What war has always been is a puberty ceremony.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

39. “Teaching, may I say, is the noblest profession of all in a democracy.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Teaching Quotes

40. “Enjoy your body, use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it, it’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

41. “When I write, I feel like an armless, legless man with a crayon in his mouth.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Crazy Quotes, Humor Quotes

42. “New knowledge is the most valuable commodity on earth. The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

43. “All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

44. “I was a victim of a series of accidents, as are we all.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

45. “Maturity, the way I understand it, is knowing what your limitations are.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

46. “We could have saved the Earth but we were too damned cheap.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

47. “And I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: Healing Quotes

48. “If you can’t write clearly, you probably don’t think nearly as well as you think you do.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

49. “History is merely a list of surprises. It can only prepare us to be surprised yet again.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Featured in: History Quotes

50. “Everything that ever has been always will be, and everything that ever will be always has been.”

— Kurt Vonnegut